Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

ALL SAINTS, STREATHAM BILL [Lords]

Read the Third time and passed, without Amendment.

FELIXSTOWE DOCK AND RAILWAY BILL

[Queen's Consent, on behalf of the Crown, signified.]

Bill read the Third time and passed.

LEICESTER CORPORATION BILL

As amended, considered; to be read the Third time.

DURBAN NAVIGATION COLLIERIES BILL [Lords]

Read a Second time and committed.

GREATER LONDON COUNCIL (MONEY) BILL (By Order)

Second Reading deferred till Tuesday next.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL FINANCE

Incomes (Excess Payments Tax)

Mr. Dickens: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will seek to introduce an excess payments tax to support the Trades Union Congress's voluntary incomes policy, details of which are in his possession.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Roy Jenkins): I am not sure exactly what form of tax my hon. Friend has in mind. There would be very great

difficulties about recovering excessive wage and salary payments through the taxation of individual employers or employees.

Mr. Dickens: Does my right hon. Friend realise that many of us on this side are totally opposed to the Government's proposed Prices and Incomes Bill because it is demonstrably unfair to organised labour? Second, does he realise that many of us want to see a prices and incomes policy, and we believe that the fiscal system is the only fair way to achieve it, by ensuring that incomes derived from any source are taxed in the way indicated in the Question?

Mr. Jenkins: My hon. Friend raised some rather wide issues at the beginning of his supplementary question. On the latter part, I am always willing to look at any new fiscal device, but I say to my hon. Friend again that there are difficulties in proceeding as he suggests.

United States Economy (Discussions)

Mr. Dickens: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what discussions he has had with the United States Government on current trends in the United States economy as they affect the British economy.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: My talks with the Secretary of the Treasury and others in the United States covered these subjects as well as others of mutual interest.

Mr. Dickens: Can my right hon. Friend say something about the effect on the British economy of the proposed 10 per cent. tax surcharge now passed by the House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee, and will he say what conversations or communications he has had with the American Government about the possibility of an American export rebate scheme or import surcharge?

Mr. Jenkins: The conversations I have had have been confidential. The American tax increase is a matter for the United States Government, but it is undoubtedly true that we should be glad to see measures which would strengthen the United States balance of payments. On the latter part of my hon. Friend's supplementary question, it is the British Government's view that we should be most loth to see any steps taken which might lead to an escalation of protectionism throughout the world.

Mr. Iain Macleod: Did the Chancellor have any discussions on the special drawing rights, and has he any more information to give the House on when we may expect a Bill on this matter?

Mr. Jenkins: Not specifically in America, because my visit to America followed closely after Stockholm, where I had very long discussions both with United States representatives and with others. It is certainly our intention to proceed to ratify the agreement as soon as practicable and desirable, and I think that that would be during the course of this summer.

Dividend Restraint

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will issue a White Paper defining his Department's attitude to dividend increases by public companies.

The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. John Diamond): There have already been several Ministerial statements on the subject, including a section of a White Paper.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: If the Chief Secretary is referring to paragraph 54 of Cmnd. 3590, I suggest that he reads it again, as it does not define anything. Is it not a fact that the blackmail which the Government have been exercising against companies in this matter has been abritrary, pointless and time-wasting to date, and will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that the Government neither have nor intend to take powers to compel public companies to disregard their prime obligations to their owners in the matter of distributions?

Mr. Diamond: There has been no blackmail, and I am astonished that the hon. Gentleman thinks fit to use such a term. There has been a voluntary dividend restraint scheme, which has been accepted by industry in 100 per cent. of the cases.

Mr. Dickens: Does not my right hon. Friend agree that a voluntary dividend restraint scheme is simply a postponement of the payment of unearned income? Would it not be far better to go back to the earlier idea of the present Chancellor of the Exchequer that there should be a compulsory, permanent statutory dividend limitation for all shareholders?

Mr. Diamond: I recognise that a dividend restraint scheme and a wages restraint scheme are not on all fours; but, as I have previously explained in this Chamber, different questions arise as regards restraining or restricting a dividend and paying it out. A company frequently finds, as it has more liquid funds, that it is useful to make investments with those funds rather than distribute them in the form of dividend in a subsequent year.

Mr. Frederic Harris: How can the right hon. Gentleman possibly call it a voluntary dividend restraint scheme when the Treasury give directions to company after company on the maximum dividend they can pay?

Mr. Diamond: I call it a voluntary dividend restraint scheme because up to the present there have been no powers and there has been complete correspondence with the Treasury's suggestions.

Mr. Stratton Mills: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what extent in his refusal to allow Lex Garages Limited to increase their dividend from 14 per cent. to 24 per cent. he took into account the assurances given by the company at the time of placing on the market a large block of shares in October, 1967.

Mr. Diamond: There has been no action by this company which amounts to a firm pre-Budget commitment of the limited kind which might justify a departure from the voluntary dividend restraint scheme.

Mr. Stratton Mills: Can the right hon. Gentleman clear up the question of whether or not an assurance was given by the directors of Lex Garages Limited when a substantial block of shares was placed privately last October?

Mr. Diamond: No commitment was given of the kind which would compel a dividend declaration out of line with the dividend restraint scheme.

Mr. Ridley: Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that he has no power to make Lex do this? Will he make it publicly clear that the firm is in no sense bound to follow his guidance?

Mr. Diamond: I have already given an Answer to that. This is a voluntary restraint scheme. There have been many discussions between companies intending


to declare dividends and the Treasury, and in all cases they have been satisfied that it is in the general interest that the view of the Treasury should be accepted.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: Is the right hon. Gentleman now saying that there is a distinction between a representation given privately by the directors of a company on the issue of shares and the representation given publicly by the issue of a prospectus?

Mr. Diamond: I say nothing of the sort. I did not and do not draw such a distinction. I drew a distinction between a commitment and the lack of a commitment.

Mr. Stratton Mills: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall seek to raise this matter on the Adjournment at the earliest opportunity.

Mr. Ridley: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what arrangements will be made under Her Majesty's Government's incomes and prices policy to prevent persons receiving dividends from shares in foreign companies more than 3½ per cent. greater than the dividends of previous years.

Mr. Diamond: None, Sir.

Mr. Ridley: As the prices and incomes legislation cannot possibly apply to foreign-owned companies and companies operating abroad, is not this a direct incentive to investors to invest outside the country, totally contrary to the Government's policy in this matter?

Mr. Diamond: No, Sir. That branch of policy is dealt with by other methods and no part of the intention of dividend restraint is affected.

Mr. Ridley: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer by what authority he is restraining increases in dividends.

Mr. Diamond: The Government have asked companies voluntarily to restrain dividends. Guidance is given by the Treasury as necessary on how to comply with this request.

Mr. Ridley: Is the Chief Secretary aware that Parliament has the function of preventing the Executive from doing things for which it has no authority, and

that in these circumstances the fatuous and totally irrelevant things which the Government are doing about dividends shows how wise it would have been if Parliament had been allowed to debate these measures before they were put into practice?

Mr. Diamond: Parliament was given full opportunity to debate these proposals, in the sense that my right hon. Friend made a statement in his Budget speech and I made a very long and detailed statement in my contribution to the Budget debate when contributions were made from both sides of the House. There was, therefore, ample opportunity to debate whether this should be a voluntary scheme. I am glad to say that the whole of industry so far concerned takes a view diametrically opposed to that of the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Higgins: As the Treasury has said that a percentage increase in productivity justifies an equal percentage increase in wages, is the Treasury giving the same direction about dividends?

Mr. Diamond: We are giving guidance of the kind which is fully detailed in hand-outs.

Mr. Peyton: Does not the hon. Gentleman realise that what Parliament—certainly the Opposition—objects to is government by guidance? That is totally wrong.

Mr. Diamond: I am glad to say that that is not the view reflected by industry, which is most anxious that, even when powers exist under an Act, they should not be motivated and that the whole scheme should depend on voluntary co-operation.

Mr. Ridley: On a point of order. In view of the unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Mr. Mikardo: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether Her Majesty's Government's policy of restriction' on non-employment incomes in 1968 and 1969 applies to unit trusts, investment trusts, companies owned wholly or partly by United Kingdom citizens but incorporated outside the United Kingdom, and to all close companies.

Mr. Diamond: Unit and investment trusts, whose main income derives from


companies which are themselves subject to dividend restraint, and companies not incorporated under the law of the United Kingdom, are wholly exempt from the policy. Close companies may exceed the maximum permissible level of distribution to the extent necessary to meet the requirements of the Finance Act, 1965.

Mr. Mikardo: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply. Will he be kind enough to draw it to the attention of his hon. Friend the Financial Secretary who, on 24th April, at column 396 of the OFFICIAL REPORT, told the House that there were no exceptions to dividend restraint?

Mr. Diamond: My hon. Friend the Financial Secretary has listened very carefully to what my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar (Mr. Mikardo) has said, and has whispered in my ear—and I would not dream of repeating it—that he himself said nothing of the sort.

Land Commission (Betterment Levy)

Mr. Costain: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much betterment levy so far collected by the Land Commission represents a reduction of tax collectable by the Inland Revenue.

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Harold Lever): The information on which to base an estimate is not available.

Mr. Costain: Has the Minister's attention been drawn to the Answer I received from the Minister of Housing and Local Government when I pointed out that his Department can collect money at 3·2d. in the £? Would it not be much more economical to collect this money through the normal procedure and not another agency?

Mr. Lever: This has no relevance to the Question on the Order Paper.

Mr. Higgins: Would the Minister disagree with the statement by my hon. Friend that it would be much cheaper to collect the betterment levy through the normal machinery rather than through the Land Commission?

Mr. Lever: I shall be able to answer that question when I have had notice of it.

Ministers (Overseas Visits)

Mr. Lane: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of the cost to public funds in 1968 of overseas visits by members of the Government, including staff and other persons accompanying them.

Mr. Harold Lever: All Departments have been asked to keep the total of their expenditure on overseas visits for 1968–69 to not more than the total for 1967–68, absorbing the substantial increase in costs as a result of devaluation by reducing numbers of visits. Separate estimates for visits by members of the Government within this total are not available.

Mr. Lane: While that is gratifying as far as it goes, if the hon. Gentleman is not willing to offer even an approximate estimate to the House, does not he see that this will cast fresh doubts on the Government's ability to control public expenditure?

Mr. Lever: One way of controlling Government expenditure is not to spend time on elaborate breakdowns of expenditure which are not particularly relevant.

Sir A. V. Harvey: Will the hon. Gentleman encourage Ministers, particularly junior Ministers, when travelling, at any rate in Europe, to travel by British airlines rather than by executive aircraft owned by the Board of Trade? Will he encourage them to set an example?

Mr. Lever: The most economical means of transport are always encouraged by the Treasury, and we shall continue in that practice.

Borrowing

Mr. Marten: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will make a further statement on Her Majesty's Government's policy with regard to further borrowing from central banks and Governments abroad.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: I have nothing to add to the Answer which I gave the hon. Member for Louth (Sir C. Osborne) on 30th April.—[Vol. 763, c. 166.]

Mr. Marten: Does the Chancellor intend to fund any of the short-term debts


which the present Government have incurred? If so, in the light of the Prime Minister's remarks about that on television in his devaluation broadcast, are the Government prepared to accept any strings if they are funding the short-term debts?

Mr. Jenkins: I have no proposals in that direction to announce.

Sir C. Osborne: If it is against the public interest to tell the nation of the size of our short-term debts, would not it be more honest to our creditors and ourselves to fund those debts as quickly as possible?

Mr. Jenkins: This question was dealt with at some length yesterday, when I explained that the practice I was following was exactly the same as that followed by previous Chancellors.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: The Gas and Electricity Bill which has recently come before the House contains a novel power for the gas and electricity undertakings to borrow abroad. Where will these amounts figure in the figures produced for the House? Is not this a novel departure?

Mr. Jenkins: It may be a novel departure, but the hon. Gentleman must not necessarily assume that what is novel is bad.

Inland Revenue Staff (Overtime)

Mr. Costain: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many hours of overtime will have to be worked by the Inland Revenue in order to effect the re-codings consequent upon the Budget proposals; and what remuneration will be paid for this overtime.

Mr. Harold Lever: Eight hundred thousand hours for which the remuneration paid will be about £430,000.

Mr. Costain: Is the Minister satisfied with this extra expenditure? Does not he realise that industry will have similar extra expense? Is it not all out of the productivity of the nation?

Mr. Lever: I cannot undertake to keep the tax system static merely in order to avoid any possible extra expenditure to be made in making adjustments.

Note Issue

Mr. Henry Clark: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what has been the increase in the note issue of British banks in the last 12 months; and how much Government spending and lending he intends to finance by further increases in the note issue in the current year.

Mr. Harold Lever: Between February, 1967, and February, 1968, notes in circulation increased by £157 million, from £3,041 million to £3,198 million. The size of future note issues will continue to be determined by public demand for notes.

Mr. Clark: Would not the Minister agree that printing new money at the present time represents very muddled economic thinking? As the new notes add to Government spending power, is not it true that they add directly to the speed of our already cantering inflation?

Mr. Lever: The answers to all those questions is, "No, Sir." The muddled thinking is on the part of those who believe that any increase in the supply of notes reflects an increase in the money supply. In fact, it is usually merely a convenient way of breaking up the total money supply.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: When production has been almost static, as it has been in the past year, is not it very clear thinking that the issue of £157 million more of notes must tend towards more inflation?

Mr. Lever: Not so. The increase of notes reflects the increase of cash demand by the public.

Dame Irene Ward: Give me a thousand.

Mr. Lever: The note supply is a mere fraction of the total money supply in the country.

Savings

Mr. Henry Clark: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimates he has made of the dis-saving which will result from the special levy on unearned incomes introduced in his recent Budget.

Mr. Harold Lever: As my right hon. Friend said in his speech on the Second


Reading of the Finance Bill, I consider it unlikely that savings will be affected by the special charge, which of course is for 1967–68 only.

Mr. Clark: Is not it clear that members of the public will try to maintain their standard of living and will draw on savings, and that with this tax they must draw more heavily on their capital, as with many of the other taxes? Will not this simply add to the public's propensity to consume, which is already far too high?

Mr. Lever: The first part of the hon. Gentleman's assertion is highly conjectural. The latter part, that this will add to spending, seems to me to be absolutely opposed to the normal inferences drawn from this tax.

Mr. Stratton Mills: Has the Minister considered the particular problem which will arise for shareholders in close companies, which are forced to distribute whether or not they wish to do so and may have great difficulties with this additional burden?

Mr. Lever: That problem has been considered. However, it does not relate to the Question on the Order Paper.

Export Forms (Purchase Tax)

Sir G. Nabarro: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that essential export forms, such as No. 57, Combined Certificate of Value and Origin and Invoice of Goods for Exportation to New Zealand, are subject to Purchase Tax at 33⅓ per cent., recently increased from 27½ per cent. under category 26B, and as it is Government policy not to tax exports, whether he will remove Purchase Tax from all export stationery.

Mr. Harold Lever: I regret that it would be quite impracticable to distinguish stationery used in connection with exports for the purposes of the tax.

Sir G. Nabarro: I reject absolutely that proposition. Will the Minister go away and do his homework and recognise that all these export forms by their millions annually are printed solely and specifically for the conduct of export trade, and could relatively easily be exempted from Purchase Tax? Will he examine the matter again?

Mr. Lever: I will readily look again at any matter the hon. Gentleman wants. But it is perfectly clear that the task of segregating forms in this way for Purchase Tax purposes is administratively expensive and impossible to achieve at a reasonable cost.

Cosmetics (Purchase Tax)

Sir G. Nabarro: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer why he has classified cosmetics as the most luxurious of consumer goods and increased Purchase Tax on them by 82 per cent. from 27½ per cent. to 50 per cent., and having regard to the fact that 97 per cent. of all adult females use cosmetics and 72 per cent. of all adult males, whether he will now regard cosmetics as essentials and reduce Purchase Tax on them to 20 per cent. as for soft drinks.

Mr. Harold Lever: In a Budget in which it was necessary to propose extensive increases in indirect taxation, cosmetics could not be excluded from the range of less essential goods now subject to the 50 per cent. rate of purchase tax.

Sir G. Nabarro: But does the Minister realise that his rearrangements of Purchase Tax are entirely retrogressive in that they are widening the gulf between articles most extensively in demand for ordinary and necessary every-day usage, and the most sumptuary articles? Why should he tax cosmetics at 2½ times as much as soft drinks?

Mr. Lever: Cosmetics must be regarded as among the less essential, though very commonly used, articles, and the rate of tax seems appropriate in the circumstances of this year's Budget.

Mr. Ronald Atkins: Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be more appropriate to bring the Purchase Tax nearer the tax on whisky since those who drink cosmetics are drinking spirits rather than Coca Cola?

Mr. Lever: I think that the rates are very appropriately judged.

Selective Employment Tax

Mr. Tilney: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in the interests of exports, he will seek to relieve export merchants of Selective Employment Tax in the audited ratio of the volume of


export sales to that of any sales in the home market.

The Minister of State, Treasury (Mr. Dick Taverne): No, Sir.

Mr. Tilney: Do not the Government realise that only in a very few cases does the manufacturer sell his product overseas? It is done by
export merchants. Why do the Government think that to make something is good but that to sell or maintain it overseas is apparently bad?

Mr. Taverne: The Government do not think that at all. One of the reasons why the hon. Gentleman's request cannot be complied with is that it would, if supported by some special concession to services ancillary to the export of goods, be contrary to some of our international obligations.

Mr. MacDonald: If my hon. and learned Friend cannot agree to the suggestion in the Question, will he consider the recommendations made by the Kleinwort Committee in respect of relief of this tax to export houses and merchant banks in the City in connection with exports?

Mr. Taverne: Another difficulty is that many services are concerned with exports. If we gave a refund or some other concession to all services connected with exports, as the Bland Committee pointed out, only the distributive trade would be left bearing the S.E.T.

Mr. Iain Macleod: Does the hon. and learned Gentleman really need the Reddaway inquiry to confirm the belief that the work of export merchants is vastly more important than a whole range of manufacturing? Will he not be better employed in planning to get rid now of the S.E.T. and to replace it with one of the variants of a sales or value-added tax?

Mr. Taverne: The importance of the work of these houses is acknowledged, but they have had a considerable gain through devaluation.

Import Prices

Sir C. Osborne: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that since devaluation import prices have increased by 9½ per cent. and export prices by only 43½ per cent.; how much

this further increases Great Britain's balance of payments problems; how long he expects this situation to continue; and what steps he proposes to reverse this trend.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: I would refer the hon. Member to the Answer which he was given by my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade on 24th April.—[Vol 763, c. 209–10.]

Sir C. Osborne: But that was a completely unsatisfactory Answer. Is not the Chancellor aware that we import half our food and all our raw materials, that we are paying 9 to 9½ per cent. more in import prices and that we export one-third of what we manufacture and get 14 per cent. less for that? Surely that must increase the deficit on our balance of payments. Will he explain why he thinks there is no truth in what I am saying?

Mr. Jenkins: The hon. Gentleman is saying so many things that I would hesitate to say that there is no truth in any of them. What is inevitably the case is that devaluation increases the price of imports and, broadly, decreases the price of exports, which is one reason why it improves the competitive position of exports and should also improve the competitive position of import substitution.

Mr. Winnick: While there are strong reasons for not doing so, are there not equally strong reasons in the present difficulties for having, for a brief period, some degree of import control?

Mr. Jenkins: As my hon. Friend recognises, there are very strong reasons against that.

Sir G. Nabarro: Does the right hon. Gentleman consider that it would be unpatriotic to observe that many of us think that the balance of payments position is steadily deteriorating and not improving?

Mr. Jenkins: I note the hon. Gentleman's views, which I treat on this as on all other subjects with the respect they deserve.

Balance of Payments

Sir C. Osborne: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much more Great Britain must earn than it spends


in 1968 in order to wipe out the £540 million adverse balance of payments which occurred in 1967, and to repay the foreign loans due for repayment in 1968.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: I have nothing to add to what I said on this subject in my Budget Speech.—[Vol. 761, c. 255 and 258.]

Sir C. Osborne: May I beg the right hon. Gentleman not to give me a clever but a proper answer? Will he promise the country that, by the end of this year and for this year, we shall be in balance of payments? Secondly, can he get his trade union allies to believe what he tells them—that they must produce £750 million mole of wealth without their being paid a brass farthing more for producing it?

Mr. Jenkins: I did not give the hon. Gentleman a clever answer and did not intend to do so. But I cannot add usefully, in answer to a Question. to what I outlined as best I could in my Budget Statement and elsewhere, and which cannot be amplified in the course of 10 words or so at Question Time.

Mr. Biffen: In view of the trade figures since devaluation, including those published today, is it the right hon. Gentleman's expectation rather than his hope that we shall be in balance during the coming year and have a surplus of £500 million on current account next year?

Mr. Jenkins: I see no reason to revise my view that it is essential for this country to go for a very large balance of payments surplus in 1969.

Government Departments (Advertising)

Mr. Hannan: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will give a general instruction to all Government Departments, particularly those responsible for the publicly-owned industries, to refrain from taking advertising space in journals showing extreme racialist views and comments.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: The general rule is that advertising by Government Departments and publicly-owned industries is so placed as to achieve the required results in the most economical way and does not have regard to editorial policy.

Mr. Hannan: Does my right hon. Friend appreciate that I do not dissent from his view that the individual must have freedom of expression? But is he aware that the Illustrated County Magazine Group is disseminating filthy, arrogant and offensive copy through a chain of regional magazines throughout the country? Is it right that public money should be used for advertisements in such magazines?

Mr. Jenkins: I will look at any case which my hon. Friend wishes to draw to my attention, but there is difficulty in departing from the principle I have laid down without getting into very deep water indeed.

Sir A. V. Harvey: Will the Chancellor give an assurance that what his hon. Friend is asking for will not apply to newspapers which criticise the Government?

Mr. Jenkins: I think that we would have to restrict our advertising very considerably.

Regional Seats of Government (Central Office of Information)

Mr. Hugh Jenkins: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what will be the responsibilities of the Central Office of Information in the underground regional seats of Government.

Mr. Harold Lever: It would not be in the public interest to disclose this information.

Mr. Jenkins: Would it not be in the public interest to know that civil defence and the regional seat of Government proposition are being put on a care and maintenance basis?

Mr. Lever: No, Sir.

Government Industrial Establishments (Equal Pay)

Mr. Alldritt: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer when equal pay will be applied to Government industrial establishments.

Mr. Harold Lever: As soon as economic circumstances permit.

Mr. Alldritt: Would not my hon. Friend agree that the Government should give a lead in this matter, particularly


having regard to their anxiety to enter the E.E.C., which will have implemented this principle by 1971?

Mr. Lever: I cannot set a date for this. I can only say that I sympathise with my hon. Friend's viewpoint. This cannot be regarded as an approximate prospect but rather as a future attraction which will take place. The Government will certainly give a lead as soon as economic circumstances permit.

Dr. Summerskill: Will my hon. Friend say whether equal pay will be introduced for these women before the next General Election?

Mr. Lever: I cannot make a prediction of that kind. I do not even know when the General Election is likely to be.

International Liquidity

Mr. Gresham Cooke: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the long-term policy of Her Majesty's Government in the field of international liquidity.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: To co-operate with other countries in the development of a monetary system which will provide for an orderly growth of liquidity so that the world's output and trade can continue to expand.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: In order to increase international liquidity to take care of trade, what is the Government's long-term policy—to raise the price of gold, or to try to get rid of gold in favour of special drawing rights?

Mr. Jenkins: The policy of the Government is to believe that the present system can and should last for a considerable time, and beyond that to move in an orderly way to secure a system which does not restrict world trade.

Scrip Issues

Mr. Hordern: asked the Chanceller of the Exchequer on what grounds the Treasury based its decision to refuse permission to the board of Rest Assured to give an issue of scrip to its shareholders.

Mr. Diamond: Companies have been asked to defer normal scrip issues for the time being as they are widely misunderstood by the public.

Mr. Hordern: Do not the Government realise that capitalisation of reserves brings no material benefit whatever to the shareholder? Is not this an example of the bovine attitude of the Government which does more damage to sterling than anything else could?

Mr. Diamond: No, Sir. I understand full well what happens when a normal scrip issue is distributed and I understand that there are many cases, and it may be most cases, when there is no real transfer of value, but that is not so in every case. I am saying that there is widespread misunderstanding, that the need for scrip dividends is often not pressing and that it would therefore be in the general interest of the whole policy of restraint, which is valuable to the economy, that there should be postponement in appropriate cases.

Mr. Iain Macleod: Is the Chief Secretary putting it forward as a serious proposition that companies, businesses and firms should refrain from an ordinary business practice because some extremely ill-informed people may not understand it?

Mr. Diamond: I am putting it forward as a sensible contribution to the restraint of dividends and the incomes policy.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: Can the Chief Secretary explain why scrip issues are forbidden, but share splits are allowed?

Mr. Diamond: It depends on the exact nature of the scrip issue.

Mr. Hordern: On a point of order. In view of the unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Central and Local Government Expenditure

Mr. Wingfield Digby: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what percentage of the gross national product he estimates will be taken by central and local government spending, including national and health insurance contributions and interest on loans to local authorities and public corporations, in the coming year; and what was the figure for 1963.

Mr. Diamond: Total expenditure by central government and local authorities


—as defined in Table 47 of the 1967 National Income and Expenditure Blue Book—amounted to 40·6 per cent. of the size. of gross national product in 1963. This includes the outgoings of the National Insurance Funds but does not include interest on loans to local authorities or to public corporations. An equivalent figure for 1968–69 cannot be given at this stage.
As my right hon. Friend the former Chancellor of the Exchequer explained to the hon. Member last July, this relationship does not provide a particularly useful measure of the share of national output taken by the public sector or its constituent parts.—[Vol. 750, c. 201.]

Mr. Digby: But is it not a fact that there is nothing for trade in this increasing Government share, and that it is retarding our export drive?

Mr. Diamond: No, Sir. I would not accept that view for a moment.

Halfpennies

Mr. Lipton: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer why the Royal Mint struck 100 million halfpennies last year although they will be demonetised in August, 1969.

Mr. Harold Lever: Halfpennies were minted and issued in 1967 to meet a continuing demand from the public.

Mr. Lipton: As it costs more than a penny to mint a halfpenny, is not this policy of halfpenny foolish, pound foolish quite ridiculous? What are we to do with these millions of halfpennies when they go out of circulation, as they will in the not-too-distant future?

Mr. Lever: These halfpennies were issued to meet public demand.

Mr. Lipton: Nobody wants them.

Mr. Lever: My hon. Friends says that nobody wants them, but they were issued precisely because there was considerable public demand for them, and they were released against that public demand. The loss per halfpenny is not great and amounts to no significant sum compared with the public convenience involved.

Unemployment

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what steps he now intends to take to relieve the deflationary measures, in view of the upward trend in unemployment.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: None, Sir. The Government's measures are not deflationary, but on the contrary are intended to create the conditions for an export-led expansion on a scale permitting a downward trend in unemployment.

Mr. Allaun: Is not the Chancellor's gamble on his vast inroads into future home consuming power being taken up by increased exports? What happens if they do not grow sufficiently?

Mr. Jenkins: No, Sir. In present circumstances the gamble would be not to allow room for the export demand to be met as it builds up. I certainly think that there is no possibility of achieving, as I think that we can achieve, a secure underpinning of the balance of payments position if we change our policy at a few weeks' notice.

Mr. Marten: If the policy is not deflationary, how can the Chancellor explain the fact that in the last 16 months unemployment has been above the 500,000 wholly unemployed mark on 12 occasions, while during the whole of the 13 years it was above that mark on only seven occasions?

Mr. Jenkins: I accept everything the hon. Gentleman says, but the fact of the matter is that, contrary to the views sometimes expressed, the Budget, combined with other factors in the situation, is not intended to have, and in my view over a period will not have, a net deflationary effect.

Mr. Mendelson: In view of the recent trends in the unemployment figures, is there not a danger that there might be greater need to support an export boom by a boom at home? Would my right hon. Friend not be running too great a risk if he did not encourage more investment at home, to support the development of our exports?

Mr. Jenkins: I am very anxious to see a strong development of investment


at home, but I do not think that a consumer-led boom at home would support the export boom, as my hon. Friend says.

Mr. Hordern: If taking £923 million out of the economy is not deflationary, what figure would the Chancellor put as being deflationary?

Mr. Jenkins: I said taking that, in connection with other factors, and I stick to this. I noticed that yesterday upstairs, the hon. Gentleman was urging me to do more to contain a consumer-led boom.

Mr. Michael Foot: Can the Chancellor tell us when we may expect a substantial reduction in the present high level of unemployment, and can he give us some clear assurance that the Government have completely abandoned any idea of maintaining, permanently, a larger margin of unused resources than we have had in the past 10 years?

Mr. Jenkins: I have no desire at all to maintain the present level of unemployment, but I believe that it is essential that, as that level is reduced, and as production takes up, it should be done, if we are to cure our balance of payments difficulties, by means of an export-led boom.

Ministerial Salaries

Mr. Hugh Fraser: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will give a breakdown of the increases in Ministerial salaries from £591,225 on 4th April to £613,850 on 23rd April.

Mr. Diamond: As explained to the hon. Member for South Angus (Mr. Bruce-Gardyne) on 29th April, the net increase was, in fact, £14,125, made up of £8,500 for the Paymaster-General, whose office had been vacant since November, 1967, and £5,625 for a Minister of State. In aggregate salary costs the percentage increase is 2·4 per cent.—[Vol. 763, c. 126.]

Mr. Fraser: These figures become more and more confusing. Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that on 17th April he said that the total increase in Ministerial salaries was £28,500? Even so, is it not absurd to make this sort of increase in Ministerial salaries without any increase in official productivity at all? This is government by Bonnie and Clyde.

Mr. Diamond: The right hon. Gentleman must naturally expect an accurate answer to the Questions he asks, and if he compares different dates he will surely get different answers. The figure of the number of Ministerial appointments is now less than it was in October, 1967, and several less than it was in November, 1965.

Mr. Lubbock: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider introducing a system of payment by results for Ministers?

Mr. Diamond: I should be glad to receive suggestions from the hon. Gentleman.

Share Prices

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that the share index on the London Stock Exchange has risen from 127·8 on 19th March to l49·3 on 30th April; and if he will introduce the permanent limitation of dividends.

Mr. Diamond: Dividends are not the sole factor influencing share prices.

Mr. Allaun: In view of the continuing share boom—since Budget day—how can the Government expect wage restrictions to be accepted? Would not this suggestion create, or restore, some sense of fair play, particularly as temporary dividend limitation merely increases capital values?

Mr. Diamond: My hon. Friend will have noticed that the recent activities on the Stock Exchange do not entirely support the basis of his question.

Imports

Mr. Barnett: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what action he proposes to take to counter the effect on the balance of payments of the continuing high level of imports.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: Devaluation will help to make import substitution practical and profitable, but it is bound to take time for the benefits of devaluation to be realised.

Mr. Barnett: With imports for April only £7 million down, at £645 million, and consumer demand still at a very high level, does my hon. Friend not feel that some further action is needed if we


are to get the £500 million surplus next year that he is talking about? Would he consider looking again at the question of further restriction on capital outflow?

Mr. Jenkins: That is a somewhat different question from the one that my hon. Friend has on the Paper. It is the case that reduction in imports is taking some time to work through, but I reiterate the point I made in reply to an earlier Question, that it is vitally important that we do not encourage the development of protectionism throughout the world.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIVIL NUCLEAR DISASTER (FALL-OUT)

Mr. Marten: asked the Prime Minister which Departments are responsible for dealing with a civil nuclear disaster leading to fall-out spreading over the country.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Wilson): An event of the kind described by the hon. Member is highly improbable. Nevertheless, the many Departments who would have a rôle to play have inter-related contingency plans for any credible emergency. As the House knows, general responsibility for co-ordinating Ministerial action on civil emergencies rests with my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

Mr. Marten: Is the Prime Minister aware of the really genuine anxiety existing in the country that in the event of a civil nuclear disaster—and it could happen—there will be fall-out drifting across the country and that arrangements are inadequate to cope with it? Could the Prime Minister clarify, perhaps without reference to previous speeches, precisely what would happen, say, next year when civil defence is disbanded?

The Prime Minister: This was dealt with rather fully in a speech by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department in the debate on civil defence on 28th March. I know that the hon. Member would not want me to go over all the very extensive ground then covered on civil disasters of all kinds where the civil defence forces have provided a very notable addition to the professional skills of those involved. We should still have all the organisations

listed by my hon. Friend on that occasion.

Mr. Philip Noel-Baker: Does the Prime Minister recall that the radioactivity released by the accident at Wind-scale was as great as, or greater than, the radioactivity released at Hiroshima? In view of the very great dangers, could he institute a very careful survey of all nuclear plant, civil and military?

The Prime Minister: Following Wind-scale, the most elaborate precautions were taken not only to prevent a recurrence but to deal with any lessons learned. On that occasion, as I recall it, the situation was prevented from getting out of hand by the very great bravery of the manager of the plant and his immediate staff. When it is a question of a nuclear civil disaster as opposed to other serious disasters, this is an area where enormous professional expertise is needed, and this is provided in the main by the Atomic Energy Authority staffs.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Has the Prime Minister not noticed the number of events that have overtaken his Administration which he considered improbable before they happened?

Mr. Hugh Jenkins: Now that civil defence is on a care and maintenance basis, does my right hon. Friend not think that it would be a wise practice to put the Polaris submarines on the same basis?

The Prime Minister: That is an entirely different question, which we have debated on many occasions in this House.

Oral Answers to Questions — SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL (STATUE)

Mr. Tilney: asked the Prime Minister whether he will consider erecting, at public expense, a statue in Parliament Square of the late Sir Winston Churchill to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Sir Winston's first Parliamentary contest.

The Prime Minister: Mr. Speaker, these are matters in which the House prefers to move by agreement, and I am sure we are all grateful to the hon. Member for giving us this opportunity to see whether there is broad public support for his proposal. Were this to


prove the case, the Government would be prepared to enter into consultations with the opposition parties and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House would be available for discussions through the usual channels. I could not, of course, in advance of any specific proposal give, nor would the House expect me to give, any undertaking about finance.

Mr. Tilney: While thanking the Prime Minister for that reply, may I ask him to bear in mind that there is no statue in the centre of London, available to be seen by the public at all times, of perhaps the greatest leader of this nation and the greatest Parliamentarian for centuries? Could such a statue be put up while those of us who remember and were inspired by his speeches are still alive?

The Prime Minister: What I have said is that the hon. Gentleman's Question provides a valuable opportunity to gauge public support for this. As the right hon. Gentlemen the Leader of the Opposition and the Leader of the Liberal Party know, we would be ready to enter into discussions in the light of such public demand.

Mr. Shinwell: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the House has already agreed that a memorial should be erected to the late Sir Winston Churchill on a plinth outside the Chamber? Ought we not to wait until that project has been completed before considering any further projects?

The Prime Minister: That is the decision of this House. The hon. Gentleman, as I understand his suggestion, wants a public statue outside to be seen by passers-by as well as those who come into this House. In my original Answer, I said what I thought the attitude of the Government would and should be.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that there are already too many ugly statues about in the centre of London, that the pigeons treat them with great irreverence and that in any case another statue or memorial to Sir Winston Churchill is absolutely unnecessary because nobody can forget him?

The Prime Minister: The last few words of my hon. Friend will be echoed in all parts of the House. On the earlier part of his supplementary question, it would probably be felt, if not by this age then by succeeding ages, that the proliferation of statues of varying aesthetic quality in the capital perhaps pays an undue proportion of tribute to the lesser known figures of the 19th century compared with the tributes paid to those of the 20th century.

Mr. Heath: Is the Prime Minister aware that we should be willing to enter into discussions with him in the circumstances which he has described, but has he in mind any particular ways of ascertaining the public view about this matter?

The Prime Minister: I think that this is a matter which we could discuss with the right hon. Gentleman; and the views of hon. Members in all parts of the House, made available through the usual channels, would be of very keen importance in such a decision.

Oral Answers to Questions — REGIONAL EMPLOYMENT POLICY

Mr. Blaker: asked the Prime Minister whether he is satisfied with the division of responsibility regarding regional employment policy between the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs and the President of the Board of Trade; and if he will make a statement.

The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir.

Mr. Blaker: Is the Prime Minister aware that the latest seasonally adjusted figures for wholly unemployed show that the rate of unemployment is rising faster in the North of England and Wales, both of which are development areas, than it is nationally? Does not this indicate that something is wrong?

The Prime Minister: Over the months from last August to April—and the same would be found if we took other dates for the starting point—three-quarters of the improvement in the seasonally adjusted figure for wholly unemployed has occurred in the development areas. There are little interchanges between some of these areas. At the moment, while the Northern Region and Scotland


have not yet shown a very big improvement in the number of jobs, the prospects look slightly better in many respects than for Wales. The problem of colliery closures in Wales is very central, as in other areas, but the measures which we have taken should have a very big effect indeed on employment in all three areas.

Oral Answers to Questions — ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS

Mr. Moonman: asked the Prime Minister what further changes he plans to make in the co-ordination of the work of other Ministers and Departments in the light of the recent changes in the responsibilities for economic and social affairs.

The Prime Minister: These matters are kept under regular review and I would be happy to consider any specific point my hon. Friend might care to make.

Mr. Moonman: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there would be a considerable measure of support among Members, possibly on both sides of the House, for an extension of structural changes in the Government machine which could improve decision-making as well as such other related matters as the size of Cabinet and the use of Ministers without Portfolio?

The Prime Minister: These changes are going on all the time. My hon. Friend's supplementary question was in very general terms. Knowing his connection with industry and efficiency devices in industry, I should be happy to receive any specific proposals which he may have to put to me.

Sir C. Osborne: But since the Prime Minister has greater knowledge of and authority over economic affairs than any of his Ministers, why does not he resume responsibility for them himself?

The Prime Minister: I have already described in the House the general responsibility in these matters. Any Prime Minister must have a very central responsibility, particularly when for some years past we have been dealing not only with balance of payments problems but with a no less important and essential contribution to solving the balance of

payments problem, namely, the need for a continuing drive to restructure British industry.

Mr. Heath: As a result of the new arrangements made by the Prime Minister for the co-ordination of Government Departments, does responsibility for laying the regulations reinstituting prescription charges rest with the Lord President or with the Minister of Health? Is it intended that prescription charges shall still become effective on 10th June? If so, when will the regulations be laid?

The Prime Minister: On the first part of the right hon. Gentleman's supplementary question, the position, as I have informed the House, is that the Ministry of Health continues in being, and my right hon. Friend has a responsibility for laying these charges. They will be laid in time to take effect on the due date, which is correctly described by the right hon. Gentleman.

Oral Answers to Questions — LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (SPEECH)

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: asked the Prime Minister whether the public speech of the Lord President of the Council to the Conference of the Transport and General Workers Union at Birmingham on 28th January about devaluation and withdrawal from the East represents the policy of Her Majesty's Government.

The Prime Minister: I have answered seven previous Questions on this speech, Sir. The Answer remains unchanged.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Is the Prime Minister aware that all seven of those Answers, which I have studied, were evasive? Will he now create a precedent by giving a straight answer to the question of whether or not he regards devaluation as having been a big stride on the road to Socialism?

The Prime Minister: The reply which I gave on seven occasions was, "Yes, Sir", which was unequivocal. To all seven questions put I said, "Yes, Sir". If the right hon. Gentleman is now referring to supplementary questions, he will find, if he studies the speech, that the quotation
which he attributes to my right hon.
Friend was not a correct one. He did not say that it was a great stride on


the road to Socialism—[HON. MEMBERS:"…a giant stride."] He did not say that it was a giant stride on the road to Socialism. I refreshed my memory of the speech again this morning. He referred to the great opportunities created by devaluation and two other measures, the second of which was the defence decisions, opposed by right hon. Gentlemen opposite, and the third was a reference to the Budget which was then in prospect but not available to the House. My answer in respect of what he said in relation to all three is, "Yes, Sir; it does represent the view of Her Majesty's Government".

Mr. Peyton: rose—

Mr Hon. Members: Oh.

Mr. Peyton: Does the Prime Minister appreciate how much we admire him when he is being at least consistent in his handling of this question? But still we have nothing from him. Are we to deduce from that that any suggestion of a giant stride towards Socialism is now to be abandoned? If so, that will be welcome.

The Prime Minister: I do not think that, most unusually, that supplementary question justified the enormous public expectation which resulted from the hon. Gentleman's rising to his feet. I have answered a Question about what my right hon. Friend said in relation to the three measures which I have mentioned. If the hon. Gentleman now wishes to raise wider issues of progress towards Socialism, we shall be very glad to answer him at any time.

Oral Answers to Questions — DEPUTY LEADER OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Biggs-Davison: asked the Prime Minister why he designated the Patronage Secretary to be Deputy Leader of the House.

The Prime Minister: Because this seemed to me to be in all respects an appropriate appointment, Sir.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: But, in view of the Leader of the House's responsibility to maintain the rights of private Members, is it not wrong for his deputy to be the member of the Executive concerned with patronage and necessarily its most

partisan member? What is the point of this innovation?

The Prime Minister: In the first place, I thought that it might be for the greater convenience of the House. Secondly, I thought that it was about time that we got away from the ancient doctrine that Chief Whips should never be heard in the House. We all like hearing our Chief Whips, of all parties. The hon. Gentleman will know that it has not been our practice in office to give lavish awards of patronage to sitting Members. It is a complete change in practice from that of our predecessors.
With regard to the Leader of the House's responsibility to the House as a whole and the difficulty that he should also have a party position, it was the Conservative Party, not us, which had two successive Leaders of the House who were Chairmen of the Conservative Party, which we were recently told is a full-time job.

Mr. Shinwell: Does it follow from my right hon. Friend's reply that in future the Chief Whip, instead of being non-vocal as Chief Whips have been in the past, will reply to questions on, for example, matters of discipline and patronage?

The Prime Minister: If it were necessary owing to the unavoidable absence of the Leader of the House, my right hon. Friend, of course, could appropriately answer any questions which are correctly addressed to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. I do not think that they would go quite as wide as those which my right hon. Friend has in mind.

Mr. Lubbock: Is the Prime Minister aware that we welcome the way in which the Government have copied the example set by the Liberal Party for so long about not requiring Whips to remain silent? We look forward to the time when the third party in the House joins this new exercise.

The Prime Minister: We are always glad to hear from the third party in the House through its Chief Whip on any appropriate occasion. I should remind the hon. Gentleman that when we were in opposition I started the practice—rather late in those years, I agree—of inviting the then Opposition Chief Whip to take part in debates, particularly on


Parliamentary procedure and
Parliamentary reform. I think that this is much welcomed by the House and will be welcomed generally.

Mr. Heffer: Is my right hon. Friend aware that most hon. Members will not object to hearing the Chief Whip or any other Whip, but they may object to what is said by them?

The Prime Minister: That question is not necessarily limited to the Chief Whip of any party or to any spokesman for any party.

Mr. Dodds-Parker: Will the Prime Minister tell the House now what full-time job Lord Wigg is to do in the Government?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE (SUPPLY)

Ordered,
That this day Business other than the Business of Supply may be taken before Seven o'clock.—[The Prime Minister.]

STAG-HUNTING WITH HOUNDS (ABOLITION)

3.23 p.m.

Mr. Marcus Lipton: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to abolish stag-hunting with hounds.
I welcome this opportunity of addressing what is still an unusually large audience of right hon. and hon. Members, even after the recent departures.
Over three years ago—on 10th February, 1965, to be precise—I introduced a similar Bill to prohibit stag-hunting with hounds, and I make no apology for reintroducing the Bill again.
Two recent incidents and a television broadcast of a stag hunt have again focused attention on the vile abomination of this so-called sport. In one case a stag was chased into the town centre of Barnstaple and there shot. In the second case, a stag, after being hunted for many miles, was shot in the town centre of Porlock, less than 100 yards from the main street. In both cases bystanders were revolted by what they saw.
I have had many letters from people everywhere, in particular, from people in the West Country and from a lady in Hull who has been very active in the campaign against this form of blood sport. These letters indicate that even in the West Country decent-minded civilised citizens want no more of this horrible spectacle. The need now is to see an end to this kind of killing altogether.
In Porlock, the two shots which killed
the exhausted stag were fired with a minute's interval between, which I would not regard as very efficient shooting. Nevertheless—

Mr. Marcus Kimball: rose—

Hon. Members: Sit down.

Mr. Speaker: Order. It is not usual to intervene in a Ten Minute Rule Bill.

Mr. Lipton: I was saying that in Porlock the shooting did not indicate a very high standard. Nevertheless, the joint master of the Devon and Somerset Stag Hounds had the brazen effrontery to say that it had been a perfectly conducted hunt.
I could not dispute that it may be necessary to thin down deer in the West Country and elsewhere, but surely it is possible to effect this by more humane methods than the barbarity of stag-hunting with hounds. It will be remembered that during the last war stags were rounded up, delivered into compounds, and shot. Organised shoots, as would be provided for in my Bill, with the possible use of helicopters and tranquilliser darts, are a much more effective method than the killing for fun under which these mounted popinjays indulge their degraded blood lust, supported in so many cases by a retinue of gloating followers in cars, Land Rovers, jeeps and on motor cycles.
On Forestry Commission estates stags are thinned out by organised shoots. I want the same methods to be employed in the West Country without all the disgusting paraphernalia of stag-hunting as practised there at present. I know that
a selfish minority of so-called sportsmen are bitterly opposed to my proposed Bill. Some of them are in the House today. I want them to have the courage to vote against my Motion today. I want them to have the guts to go into the Division Lobby and vote against my Motion rather than skulk in cowardly anonymity and shout "object" on Second Reading without the world knowing who they are. Let us know who these hon. Members are. That is why I do not want an unopposed acceptance of my Motion today. I want those hon. Mem-

bers who think that stag-hunting is great fun as practised by the Devon and Somerset Hunt to go into the Lobby this afternoon and vote against the Motion or forever hold their peace—especially on Friday at 4 p.m.
A widely experienced deer hunter wrote in a recent issue of a Barnstaple paper describing what happens when the pack ravage the exhausted stag. He said:
Hinds suffer even worse. They are hunted while they have a calf at their feet and are carrying a live calf inside them. I make known this information for the benefit of those seeking the truth and in the hope that the day will dawn when this barbarity, carried on under the guise of sport, is stopped.
The writer did not add, as he might have done, that the embryo was ripped out as part of this filthy ritual.
I ask the House to accept the Motion.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Lipton, Mrs. Braddock, Dr. John Dun-woody, Mr. Michael Foot, Mr. Emrys Hughes, Sir B. Janner, Mr. Peter Mahon, Mr. McNamara, Mr. Newens, Mr. Oakes, Mr. Spriggs, and Mr. Winnick.

STAG-HUNTING WITH HOUNDS (ABOLITION)

Bill to abolish stag-hunting with hounds, presented accordingly and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Friday, 17th May, and to be printed. [Bill 151.]

Orders of the Day — SUPPLY

[22ND ALLOTTED DAY [FIRST PART],— considered.

SIR FREDERICK CRAWFORD (WITHDRAWAL OF PASSPORT)

Mr. Speaker: Before I open the debate perhaps I might announce that I have not selected the Amendment in the names of the right hon. and learned Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot) and some of his hon. Friends. The debate will end at seven o'clock according to Standing Order 18 (3). I urge those who wish to take part to make brief speeches.

3.41 p.m.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: I beg to move,
That this House condemns Her Majesty's Government for withdrawing Sir Frederick Crawford's passport.
The Motion is a direct consequence of the Government's decision to impound the British passport of Sir Frederick Crawford, and of the replies given by the Commonwealth Secretary to Questions last Thursday when he failed to establish any justification for his action, at least in the opinion of this side of the House.
The House will recall the exchanges on Thursday. On the day before, Wednesday, at about 1.30 p.m., I learned from a friend of Sir Frederick that his passport had been removed. Knowing his reputation as a liberal-minded man, and as the most non-political of persons, I felt that that must have been a mistake by an official at London Airport.
I therefore telephoned the right hon. Gentleman's office and hoped, when I talked to an official there, that the right hon. Gentleman might be able to seize the chance of acting rapidly, because I anticipated that if the action was allowed to stand all concerned in that decision would be made a public laughing-stock. I wish that the right hon. Gentleman had got that message in time. I believe that he did not get it until about nine o'clock that night. If he had got it in time, I feel that he might have been

able to do something to reverse the decision.
We now know that I was wrong to assume that that was an airport official's error. There must have been a blacklist from which the passport officer took Sir Frederick's name, and what the House will wish to establish this afternoon is was there such a list, is there such a list, who is on it, and is this blacklist confined to British airports? As I shall tell the House in a moment, one British subject in this Rhodesian context has had his passport confiscated in Malta, a Commonwealth country, and another by the German authorities in Frankfurt.
Is this list circulated overseas within the Commonwealth and elsewhere abroad? What qualifications are there for membership of that list? Are they that the individual has been seen in company with or associating with the Smith régime in Rhodesia? Or is it that the individual has assisted the Rhodesian Government by, let us say, retaining some commercial connections in that country?
We can only judge by the cases which have come to light so far. There is that of Sir Frederick Crawford. In spite of the occasional jeers from the benches opposite, I repeat that Sir Frederick's record is well known to everybody in Britain and in Africa. He has always been recognised as a liberal figure who has taken no part whatsoever in active politics either in Rhodesia or in Britain—

Mr. Stanley Orme: There is no such person.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: —and he is a director of the Anglo-American Corporation.

Mr. Orme: Ah.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: Everybody, except perhaps the hon. Member for Salford, West (Mr. Orme), who said "Ah", knows that the Anglo-American Corporation has gone out of its way to invest in and develop African countries for the benefit of Africans.
The second case which has come to the notice of the House since that of Sir Frederick's is that of Mr. Harper, an ex-Mayor of Salisbury, and a Freeman of the City of London, who, on a number of


occasions, has spoken publicly in Rhodesia against the Rhodesian Front, and has declared publicly that he has voted against Mr. Smith's Government. Is it possible that Mr. Harper has been wrongly listed; that the Mr. Harper who was meant to be listed is the member of Mr. Smith's Government? Is it that the inclusion of this ex-Mayor of Salisbury is a mistake, a case of mistaken identity? It is too bad a joke in this case. The Commonwealth Secretary shakes his head. What is the charge against Mr. Harper? He had his passport removed in Malta.
Next there is Commander Peters, a member of the Royal Navy now retired, who writes:
I personally support no political party either in Rhodesia or elsewhere.
His passport was taken away in Frankfurt, and so was that of a highly-placed civil servant who served this country during the war. He was on his way on a private visit to Norway from Rhodesia. His passport was
taken away by the German authorities, not even by the British consul. We want to know—and I think that the House wants to know—the criteria on which people are treated in this way.
On 10th April the right hon. Member for Cardiff, West (Mr. George Thomas) wrote to my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Mr. Gresham Cooke):
One general point I should like to make is that is is not only those who personally approve of Mr. Smith who have given the illegal régime effective support and encouragement.
Evidently.
I have here a letter from a young man who is about to get married to a Rhodesian girl who has been in this country for four and a half years, in other words, since before U.D.I. They are to be married in May, and the young man writes:
My fiancée, who is a Rhodesian and has lived in this country for the last four and a half years, applied for a British passport in her married name as from the date of our wedding on 25th May in the proper way, but has been told that she can only have a six-months' temporary passport. Can you please find out why this case should be different to other aliens, especially as the passport she holds at the moment is a British passport marked 'Citizen of Rhodesia' and issued before U.D.I. She has been living in this country

since before U.D.I. and should, therefore, be classed as a British citizen in her own right as a member of the Commonwealth, but she is not even being treated as well as an alien.
That kind of thing wants some justification. So does the case which hon. Members will have seen on the front page of The Times today, where a boy of 11 had his passport taken away and documents which he ought to have had improperly removed. The mind boggles at the inconvenience to the 450 people who have now had their passports interfered with in one way or another.
The House will also want to know who else is on the list. Does any director who happens to have any commercial connection at all with Rhodesia in danger of having his passport taken away if he travels to any other part of the world? Is a shareholder who has money invested in a Rhodesian company in similar dangers? The right hon. Gentleman knows that there are dozens of British companies still operating in one way or another in Rhodesia, and if those enterprises were to stop the consequences to African employment and to many other aspects of life would be appalling. Are they not listed? According to the cases which I have quoted, they should be listed—according to the Government's criteria.
The truth is that there is no other conclusion than that this is becoming a hunt, a vendetta, and it has a dangerous and an ugly look. Does not the right hon. Gentleman see the trap into which he is being led? Speaking last Thursday, he allowed himself to use these words:
There is no spite or pettiness or vindictiveness in this. Sir Frederic Crawford is in receipt of the pension to which he is entitled as a former Colonial Governor and that pension is still being paid to him."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 9th May, 1968; Vol. 764, c. 626.]
I should hope so. But it is the most shocking revelation of the processes of thought in the mind of Her Majesty's Government that the right hon. Gentleman can even have thought of the pension in this connection. I hope that we will hear no more of that kind of thing.
However, on the evidence which I have quoted—I have no doubt that hon. Members will quote many more cases—that blacklist should go, and go now. The withholding of a passport concerns the


prerogative, and hitherto that power to confiscate a passport or withhold the reason for doing so has been used with the utmost discretion by Governments over the years. I have had some experience of this and I do not think that I ever remember a case which was not either a case connected with security in relation to the Communist world—and there have been very few of these—or one in which the individual concerned might have been on bail, or something like that and, for his own protection, did not want reasons given.
There is nothing like that in this case. This blacklisting, therefore, whether or not it is connected with a United Nations resolution, is, in my view, an extension of the use of the prerogative which brings it to the point of an abuse of power.
Will the Commonwealth Secretary tell the House what offences against any law Sir Frederick has committed? The answer, as everyone in the House knows, is, "None." But he is the victim of insinuations which can damage his personal reputation and could damage his business career. This is guilt by association and it has the most sinister and ugly ring—

Mr. Frank Hooley: rose—

Mr. David Winnick: rose—

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: This is a short debate and I do not want to take long—

Mr. Andrew Faulds: Are you frightened?

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: No, I am not frightened, but the hon. Gentleman may be, one day, if he finds himself on one of the Government lists which are circulating.
The point which must be made to the Government, and it is a serious one, is that, if they persist in this course, and if they are to make lists and if they are to operate under a sort of blanket which covers hundreds of people to either issue or remove passports, there must be a redress in law. If the Government are to alter the old procedure and adopt a new, there must be a redress and an appeal in law. That, essentially, is the issue with which the House is concerned.
It is impossible to see how this action squares with the Government's intention

to attract moderate opinion in Rhodesia, but I will not be drawn away into that issue. I am not concerned with that. The question which the House must ask is: are British subjects to be blacklisted by the British Government and lists circulated here and overseas, without giving any notice to those concerned, so that they may decide whether or not to set out on a journey, and without giving any reasons when their passports are taken away? Are those people to be condemned unheard, without any resort to the law?
I therefore ask the Commonwealth Secretary to return Sir Frederick's passport. Now, however, in view of the consequential revelations which have come to all hon. Members in the last few days, that is not enough. I ask him, also, to drop the blacklist, to put it crudely, to call off the hounds, because this is a hunt and is taking the form of a vendetta.
On the wider issue of the right to a passport, I would be inclined to think—probably most hon. Members would, on reflection, consider this to be so—that it is better that it should remain a prerogative act, that is, the issue and removal of passports, but, if the Government are to use the issue and impounding of passports on a considerable scale as an accompaniment to their international political policies, then the system will have to be changed and an appellate machinery in law will have to be provided.
I understand that the right hon. Gentleman has offered to return his passport to Sir Frederick under certain conditions, in other words, that Sir Frederick has to make a declaration. I very much doubt whether the right hon. Gentleman has any such power, but that will be a matter for examination later. But I would ask him to read that declaration to the House, and what he has asked of Sir Frederick. In Sir Frederick's view, I understand, it would make it impossible for him to return to and to live in Rhodesia, and it would positively force him to do what he has never done in his life, to take political sides. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will, therefore, read the declaration.
But if he is going to ask Sir Frederick to make a declaration, it must not be confined to Sir Frederick alone. There cannot be one rule for Sir Frederick and another for all the people I have mentioned


and the hundreds more who have been affected by the removal of passports—

Mr. Faulds: And all those behind you, as well.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: I think that even the hon. Member for Smethwick (Mr. Faulds) would agree that, if a rule is made for one, it should be for all, and that is what I am asking.
If Sir Frederick has to make a declaration, and the right hon. Gentleman wishes to make this a common practice, let him say so, so that everyone in Rhodesia and in this country knows exactly where he stands.
For all these reasons, we on these benches concluded that the Government's handling of this matter was a proper target for censure.

3.59 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. George Thomson): It might be for the convenience of the House if I were to inform hon. Members immediately of the developments this morning in the case of Sir Frederick Crawford's passport, to which the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) has just referred.
What I wish to do at this stage is to give the House as much information as possible about the decision in relation to Sir Frederick Crawford, which is the subject matter of the Opposition censure Motion. Then, with your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, I will try to answer at the end of the debate the various points and questions which the right hon. Gentleman has put on the more general issues, as well as the questions which I have no doubt will be raised by hon. Members on both sides about both our Rhodesian policy and our passport policy.
When I spoke on Thursday I undertook to listen very carefully to any further representations which Sir Frederick Crawford wished to make. Accordingly, I sent an invitation to Sir Frederick to talk with one of my senior advisers on Rhodesian policy. I considered very carefully the report of that interview, and as a result I agreed to see Sir Frederick Crawford myself this

morning. My desire was to ensure, as far as I could, that no injustice was done in this case.
At this stage, I ought to tell the House more about the background to this case than I felt able to do last Thursday. I stated then that it had not been the practice under successive Governments to give reasons in the House for refusing or impounding a passport. I was assailed by one right hon. Gentleman after another from the Front Bench opposite for such "tyrannical" behaviour. They included the right hon. Member for Enfield, West (Mr. Iain Macleod), a former Colonial Secretary, and the right hon. Member for Stafford and Stone (Mr. Hugh Fraser), a former Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, who was recorded in HANSARD as twice calling us on this side Fascists.
Perhaps both right hon. Gentlemen have forgotten the times when they had troubles not only in Rhodesia, but in Kenya. On 8th November, 1960, the right hon. Member for Enfield, West was asked by Mr. Fenner Brockway, now Lord Brockway, and by my hon. Friend now the Minister of State, Ministry of Technology, why he had impounded the passports of the deputy secretary-general of the Kenya African National Union, Mr. Ochwada, who is presently a Member of the Kenya National Assembly, and of Mr. Oginga Odinga, later a Minister of the Kenya Government and now Leader of the Opposition. [Interruption.] It is apparent that some hon. Members opposite have one standard for ex-colonial Governors and a different standard for ex-colonial peoples.
To these questions by my hon. Friends of the day, the right hon. Member for Enfield, West replied in these immortal but familiar words:
It is not the practice of Governments to give reasons for action of this kind."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th November, 1960; Vol. 629, c. 29]
I recognise the deep and legitimate anxieties held by many of my hon. Friends and, no doubt, by some hon. Members opposite, about Governmental action against passports without public reason given, but I hope that I have said enough to show that, whoever has the right to feel outraged about a reluctance to renal reasons, it is not right hon. Members opposite, who did exactly the


same when they were in power. I remind the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire that, as Foreign Secretary, he had a particular responsibility for passport policy and, therefore, had a Governmental responsibility at the time when his right hon. Friend gave that answer on behalf of the Government.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: I conceded at the end of my speech that I thought that this should remain—

Hon. Members: Oh.

Mr. Speaker: Order. This is a serious debate. Noise does not help.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: I conceded that I thought that action regarding passports, should remain an act of the prerogative, but never did any Government deprive 450 people of their passports under one blanket procedure.

Mr. Thomson: The right hon. Gentleman may now say that he is in favour of continuing this as an act of the prerogative. His right hon. Friend called it Fascism. His right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) called it the act of a police State.
Despite this background, the Opposition have chosen to make this matter the subject of a Motion of censure, and Sir Frederick Crawford felt it right—I do not dispute his action—to make his case against the Government's action in strong public terms. The reluctance of successive Governments to give reasons, though they have sometimes been given privately to individuals by successive Foreign Secretaries, has been based on the general rule that, although in an individual case there might be no particular objection to publication, the general working of the passport system would be made very difficult if reasons could not be refused in other cases in which valid objections did exist. Presumably, this is the basis on which the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire, from his experience, still endorses the use of the prerogative in this respect.
It was certainly in accordance with that general rule that I refused last week to give my reasons. But rules may have exceptions, and in the exceptional circumstances which have been deliberately created by the Opposition in putting down a Motion of censure, and in view of Sir

Frederick Crawford's own public statements, I have come to the conclusion that it would be right for me to make an exception now. The Opposition have tabled a Motion of censure, the most serious Parliamentary act one can take, and the Government are entitled to defend themselves.
One factor which has sometimes led to
the withholding of reasons has been a desire to protect the individual concerned from the giving of public reasons. There, also, I now feel justified in giving the House a fuller explanation than I did on Thursday. Indeed, I feel that I owe it to Sir Frederick Crawford and some of his associates to correct certain misconceptions which have appeared in the Press, and I gladly do so straight away, before we get into more heated areas of controversy.
There is no accusation against Sir Frederick Crawford of sanctions breaking, and I have made none. Nor was the Government's action aimed in any way at the Anglo-American Corporation, of which Sir Frederick is a director. The right hon. Gentleman has paid tribute to Sir Frederick's record as a distinguished former colonial Governor, and I gladly join him in that and in a tribute to the contribution which Sir Frederick made to the policies for African advance carried out by the party opposite when in power.
But Sir Frederick's status and eminence, and particularly his past rôle in relation to the Crown, give him a position of great influence and of especial responsibility inside Rhodesia. He, above all, could be expected to set an example in adherence to legality and loyalty to the Queen's representative in Rhodesia, Sir Humphrey Gibbs. I can only report to the House the facts as I know them. Sir Frederick has adopted, ever since U.D.I., a course of behaviour which certainly gave every appearance of lending full support to the claims of the régime to have achieved legality and independence. That is the basis of the reason on which instructions were given to withdraw his passport facilities. [Interruption.] I am trying to give the House information which it sought from me last Thursday.
Since the illegal declaration of independence Sir Frederick Crawford has refrained from signing the Government House book on occasions such as the


Queen's Birthday. [Laughter.] I sometimes wonder whose side in the Rhodesian rebellion some hon. Members are on. They, perhaps, more than those of us on this side who did not have the advantages of their education and training are more familiar with what is meant by signing Government House books. Thousands of Rhodesians have made a practice, often a brave practice, of demonstrating their loyalty, through the Governor, by signing the book. As a former colonial Governor, Sir Frederick Crawford has had his own book in the past and well knows the significance of that gesture.
I might add that Sir Frederick no longer calls Sir Humphrey Gibbs, the Governor, "His Excellency" in ordinary speech in Rhodesia, but reserves the title for Mr. Dupont. I was wondering whether any hon. Members opposite would give support to that view. Sir Frederick has been active in promoting social and charitable occasions, innocuous in themselves and sometimes worthy, but used to promote the position of Mr. Dupont and Mr. Smith, who have been invited by Sir Frederick Crawford as guests of honour or as patrons of those occasions.
Sir Frederick's behaviour as President of the Bulawayo Trade Fair is only a particular example of a course of conduct which has certainly had the appearance of giving active support to the illegal regime. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] This, I remind the House, is the test which the House accepted in 1966 as giving grounds for the withdrawal of passports. Thus, this was not a sudden, arbitrary action by the present Commonwealth Secretary last Thursday. It was a decision declared to the House and accepted by the House more than two years ago.
The House should understand that since the illegal declaration of independence it has been made the object of the Bulawayo Trade Fair to turn it into a propaganda weapon against the policy of sanctions. Sir Frederick, who must have known what he was doing, lent himself to this policy. The Fair's literature, issued with the President's authority, says that
…with the advent of independence Rhodesia has become the greatest market potential in Africa…

In the same kind of literature, the 1966 Trade Fair was described as
…the clarion call to the birth of a new nation—the Rhodesian nation".
A significant step in the development of the Fair for propaganda purposes against sanctions was when in 1966, after the illegal declaration of independence, Sir Frederick invited Mr. Smith to open the Fair. In the circumstances, when the Governor had shortly before dismissed Mr. Smith from the Premiership, this invitation was a politically significant act. [HON. MEMBERS: "Shame."] This is clearly demonstrated by the fact that the Governor himself thought it necessary to resign his Vice-Presidency of the Fair. In welcoming Mr. Smith to the Fair, Sir Frederick Crawford boasted that
…burdens placed on Rhodesia from abroad had not only failed but…had enabled Rhodesia…to enter new markets not hitherto thought of.
In 1967, apparently unaffected by the Governor's resignation, it was Mr. Dupont whom Sir Frederick chose to invite to open the Fair and whom he formally welcomed. This May, immediately before coming to Britain, Sir Frederick was to be observed at the Fair as President busily taking the Duponts around and introducing Mr. Dupont to guests as "His Excellency."
I am bound to note, in the special circumstances in Rhodesia, that judges and many others holding high office have ostentatiously avoided being present at ceremonies where their presence would have accorded Mr. Dupont a status which he unlawfully claimed. Nevertheless, I do not underestimate the difficulties that the unprecedented situation in Rhodesia has created for people living there and it may well be that some do not recognise the significance of what they do.
It was against that background that, having considered what Sir Frederick said when he called at my Department last Friday, I thought it best to see him personally to satisfy myself whether his course of action had not been unthinking rather than deliberate. I accordingly invited him to see me, and I had half-an-hour's talk with him this morning.
I explained to Sir Frederick, as I have just done to the House, the reasons why his passport had been removed. I explained to him the facts I have given


to the House in regard to sanctions-braking and Anglo-Rhodesian. I told him that if he could give me certain assurances about his attitude towards the Governor, on the one hand, and the illegal régime, on the other, I would be prepared to restore his passport to him.
The assurances for which I asked were these: I asked him to assure me that he regarded the Governor as the Queen's true and lawful representative in Rhodesia, and not Mr. Dupont, who claims to hold that position. I asked him to give me an assurance that he does not accept the illegal declaration of independence as valid nor Ian Smith and the other members of the régime as lawfully holding the offices which they have assumed. I asked him to give me his word that he would take care to conduct himself, particularly in respect of the various positions he holds in the public life of Rhodesia—[HON. MEMBERS: "Patronising".] I wish that hon. Gentlemen opposite would not dissent until they have listened to what I have to say. When I have reached the end of my remarks they can then decide if they wish to dissent.
I asked Sir Frederick to give me his word that he would take care to conduct himself, particularly in respect of the various positions which he holds in the public life of Rhodesia, in such a way as to give no impression that he regards or accepts Mr. Dupont or Mr. Smith and his colleagues as being entitled to the marks of recognition and respect that are customarily paid to lawfully constituted authorities—which, in Rhodesia, means to the Governor.
Sir Frederick told me that his initial reaction was that he could not give me these assurances. I asked him, because I was not anxious to rush him into making a decision, to take time to consider this. I have now heard from him—I heard just before this debate—that he cannot give me the assurances for which I asked.
There are, no doubt, many people in Rhodesia who are anxious to avoid becoming involved in the grave political problems of the country in which they are living. But as I have explained to the House, Sir Frederick's whole course of action since the illegal declaration of independence has been such as to throw the whole weight of his influence on the side of illegal régime. He told me

that he wished to remain neutral in the present Rhodesian situation. I do not believe that this is the right posture for a man in his position to adopt; and, in any case, I cannot accept that he has, in fact, remained neutral. He has given positive support to the members of the régime. The only way he can cancel that out is by giving the kind of undertakings for which I asked.
I assure the House—and I hope that right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite will accept this—that I tried to draft these undertakings in a way that would make it as easy as possible to regain the position of detachment that he professes to wish to occupy. I really do not think that a simple affirmation of basic loyalties should present so much difficulty. I do not know on what authority the right hon. Gentleman referred to this matter—when he said that he thought that it was an unreasonable demand on Sir Frederick to ask him to make a political affirmation—for this was not a political declaration, still less a request for support for the present British Government.
Sir Frederick has claimed that his loyalty lies to the Queen. In Rhodesia today that statement can be made good in one way, and in one way only, namely, by a simple demonstration of respect and support for Her Majesty's lawful and undoubted representative, Sir Humphrey Gibbs, coupled with the avoidance of demonstrations of respect and recognition for the usurping régime.
To put it as charitably as I can, Sir Frederick apparently feels that the pressures on him in Rhodesia to conform with the illegal régime are too great to be resisted. Others have found it possible to do so. I recognise that those pressures are real, but I might add that surely those pressures inside Rhodesia, which we all try to comprehend from far away, did not compel Sir Frederick to attend a reception here in London last November in honour—if that is the right word—of the second anniversary of the illegal declaration of independence.
As Sir Frederick must have expected, his attendance was well publicised in Rhodesia, and, once again, his eminence in the life of Rhodesia gave his action an importance that would not have attached to the attendance of others, even of certain right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite. Sir Frederick's decision has


forced me to conclude that there are no grounds for altering the decision that he is one of the régime's active supporters.
The arguments about passport policy and other matters I will, with the permission of the House, leave to later. In our society in this country we have our basic loyalties in common and we do not need to place any undue importance in the outward formalities of address. But in the state in which Rhodesia now finds itself, they are the sign of where one's loyalties lie. A heavy burden rests on Rhodesians in high places as to whether they remain loyal to the lonely but brave Governor in his dignified isolation, or giving in to the pressures of those who have usurped legal rule. Those in Rhodesia who have stood by the Governor support our action over this passport. I only wish that it were the same on both sides of this House.

4.20 p.m

Mr. Sandys: The Commonwealth Secretary's speech has confirmed how right and necessary it was for the Opposition to table this Motion of censure today. The right hon. Gentleman has given the House a totally inadequate explanation of the Government's reasons for their action in this case, and we are still left completely in the dark with regard to their general policy on the withdrawal of passports.

Mr. William Hamilton: Completely in the gutter.

Mr. Sandys: As my right hon. Friend the Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) said, this stinks of a vendetta. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) the other day was criticised for saying that this was like the action of a police State. But when we heard the declaration which the Commonwealth Secretary tried to dictate to Sir Frederick Crawford this morning as a condition for returning his passport, which is the normal right of every citizen of this country without having to sign pieces of paper, all I can say is that it was very reminiscent of the confessions with which we are so familiar in totalitarian countries.

Mr. George Thomson: Will the right hon. Gentleman allow me to clarify one

point? I asked Sir Frederick Crawford to sign no piece of paper. I merely asked him to allow me to tell the House that he had given me verbally these assurances.

Mr. Sandys: It was hardly worth the right hon. Gentleman intervening to say that. What is the difference between signing a piece of paper, which perhaps might have remained private, and the right hon. Gentleman getting up and saying, "I have been authorised by Sir Frederick Crawford to make the following climb-down"? That is unworthy of the right hon. Gentleman.

Mr. George Brown: Forgive me, one moment. If I understand, Sir Frederick Crawford, an ex-colonial Governor, was asked by the Secretary of State to allow the Secretary of State to tell the House that he was loyal to the Queen's lawful and only representative in Rhodesia. Will the right hon. Gentleman tell the House why he thinks that was such an outrageous request?

Mr. Sandys: I will answer the right hon. Gentleman. First—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: This is a serious debate. Most hon. Members want to hear it.

Mr. Faulds: Why call Sandys if it is a serious debate?

Mr. Sandys: First of all, a declaration of that kind, given in the present circumstances, would have amounted to Sir Frederick Crawford saying that he had not behaved in a manner which was consistent with his loyalty to the Crown, and that he had now been brought to book by the Secretary of State. It could have no other possible interpretation.

Mr. Faulds: rose—

Hon. Members: Give way.

Mr. Speaker: The right hon. Gentleman is obviously not giving way.

Mr. Sandys: My other objection to what I regard as the high-handed attitude of the Commonwealth Secretary is, as I said before, that the issue of a passport is a normal right of ordinary citizens in this country, and it is an entire innovation, and a very offensive one, to ask people to make declarations, or to authorise Ministers to make declarations


on their behalf, before they are allowed to have a passport.
The withdrawal of Sir Frederick Crawford's passport was, in my view, a senseless act of petty vindictiveness. Frustrated in their hopes of bringing down the Smith Administration by economic pressure, the Government have tried to work off their spite and their spleen by persecuting individuals. There is nothing which the right hon. Gentleman has told us this afternoon which in any way in the slightest degree justifies the action which the Government have taken.
As has been said, Sir Frederick Crawford had a distinguished record of service to the Crown. While he was Governor of Uganda, and since he went to live in Rhodesia, he has shown a fair-minded approach to people of all races. It is well known that he was opposed to U.D.I. and that since then he has done everything he could within his sphere—

Mr. Faulds: To back it.

Mr. Sandys: —without intervening in politics, to try to heal the breach between the two countries.

Mr. Faulds: By not recognising the Queen's representative?

Mr. Sandys: When British visitors to Salisbury have been to see him he has helped to make arrangements for them to meet not only members of the Smith Government, but also Africans of every shade of political opinion.
The Commonwealth Secretary said that Sir Frederick Crawford had appeared to lend support to the Smith regime. As an example, he said that he had not signed the Governor's visitors' book. Was the right hon. Gentleman so hard up for an explanation of what he had done that he had to advance a flimsy argument of that kind?

Mr. Archie Manuel: It was a very courageous thing to do then.

Mr. Sandys: The right hon. Gentleman should be ashamed, in a debate of this kind, to have to bring forward a triviality like that. It only shows how thin is his case.
As a prominent member of an important international company, naturally,

Sir Frederick Crawford has to maintain close contact and good relations with the de facto Government.

Mr. Orme: It is illegal.

Mr. Sandys: It is the de facto Government. It is the Government which is governing Rhodesia, and people who are conducting business have to deal with realities even though the hon. Member likes to live up in the clouds.
Civil servants, the police and others in official positions when U.D.I. occurred were given certain advice by the Attorney-General. It is, I think, significant that they were not told by the British Government that it was their duty to give up their posts and stop working for the Rhodesian Government. It was left to their discretion as to where their duty lay, and how they should act. That was the only possible advice which any British Government could give in the circumstances. In fact most of them carried on and did their jobs under the Government.
Sir Frederick Crawford, who has no official position, was, I suggest, entitled to the same latitude as officials and others to carry on his normal business. I submit that that is all that he has done. This is a simple question of justice. The action of the Government is cowardly and oppressive. Anyone who believes in freedom and fair play must condemn them for their contemptible behaviour.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Mr. Bottomley.

Mr. Faulds: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. We have been forced to listen to the right hon. Gentleman's speech. Would it not now be honourable of him to tell us what convictions forced him, however reluctantly, to attend the anniversary celebrations in Southern Rhodesia House last November?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman, by now, knows that that is not a point of order.

Mr. Faulds: Perhaps he can tell us that.

Mr. Speaker: Mr. Bottomley.

Mr. Faulds: Tell us now.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Smethwick (Mr. Faulds) must contain himself. Mr. Bottomley.

4.30 p.m.

Mr. Arthur Bottomley: The right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) will not expect me to agree with the contents of his speech, but at least it was couched in civil tones, which is more than can be said about what happened at Question Time last week. I tried unsuccessfully to ask a Question, and I am bound to say that I am still resentful of the language used by right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite who made accusations to the effect that those of us who supported loyally the Constitution and the traditional practice of British behaviour should be called Fascists. Even at this hour, I would appeal to my colleagues who used that language to consider now whether they ought not to apologise.
I agree with what the right hon. Gentleman said at one stage of his speech. I am sorry that those of us who were in office in the past—his own Government and ours—did not give more serious thought to some redress by law by way of appeal when action was taken such as that necessitating the withdrawal of a man's passport. There are times when it is in the public interest that matters of this kind should not be disclosed. But I appeal not merely to this side of the House, but to all hon. Members to consider whether we ought not to look at this in a way in which there can be seen to be complete fairness, and not endeavour to do anything but right by any standard.
In last week's Sunday Telegraph, the leading article said:
It will…not be enough for the British Opposition, in Tuesday's debate, to put to the selective spite that has led to the impounding of Sir Frederick's passport. They should 'come clean' at last and declare their opposition to sanctions of any kind.
The fact is that many right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite have not "come clean" on this matter. A bipartisan policy on the application of economic sanctions would, in my judgment, have brought down the illegal regime in Rhodesia before now. The Governor of Rhodesia appealed to me at the beginning to see that there was a full and

effective application of economic sanctions. Many leaders of business did the same, and they appealed to right hon and hon. Gentlemen opposite in similar terms. It was not possible to do that and, as Commonwealth Secretary, I had to appeal to the House in a piecemeal fashion to give the Government powers to apply economic sanctions. I had to introduce a number of Orders, and one of them, in 1966, provided that British nationals who supported the illegal régime would not be granted full British passport facilities, but, instead, would be given
documentation for their return to Rhodesia.
We have gone further now. A resolution has been tabled for the United Nations Security Council stating that British nationals should be prevented from undertaking any activities
which promote or are calculated to promote the export of any commodities or products from Southern Rhodesia.
Can anyone deny that Sir Frederick is a British national, that his company is the Anglo-American Corporation, and that this Corporation is investing heavily in Rhodesia? It is investing in a nickel mine which is to produce goods for export. Sir Frederick is clearly the resident director in Rhodesia responsible for an operation calculated to promote exports.

Mr. Richard Sharples: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, as I understand it, not a penny of that money being invested in the nickel mine comes from outside Rhodesia?

Mr. Manuel: Who told the hon. Gentleman that?

Mr. Bottomley: The point that I was making is that it is promoting exports, and we have said in a resolution before the United Nations that any British national engaged in any kind of activity calculated to promote exports will be prevented from doing so.

Mr. R. T. Paget: rose—

Mr. J. J. Mendelson: No, we have heard the Tory side.

Mr. Bottomley: As I have said, Sir Frederick is clearly the resident director in Rhodesia responsible for the operation and, if we take no steps to discourage this kind of activity, the United Nations


will, in justification, have doubts about our ability and our intention to pursue a policy designed to bring the rebellion in Rhodesia to a peaceful end. It will also have the effect of encouraging those in Rhodesia who believe in violence and force to go further ahead in suggesting that sort of action.
I was very disappointed last night when I met a missionary from Rhodesia who told me that many of the liberal Africans who until now have wanted to secure a change in Rhodesia by peaceful means, are now turning aside and saying that the only way in which they can achieve it is by violence.
I have a high personal regard for the services of Sir Frederick as a distinguished ex-colonial civil servant, but I would put it to him whether he considers conscientiously that his present behaviour is in keeping with the high traditions of that Service. In fact, he is engaged actively in giving support to the illegal régime. As an ex-Governor himself, I wonder whether he has had a moment to think of the feelings of that loyal and devoted servant, the Governor, Sir Humphrey Gibbs?

Mr. Orme: He has ignored him.

Mr. Rottomley: What about the man to whom he pays homage, Mr. Dupont? He is one of the prime instigators of the police State in Rhodesia. It would have given me much pleasure to have been able to say that I have heard Sir Frederick's voice condemning actively and in a resounding manner those who practise the kind of operation which encourages a system like the one in Rhodesia at the moment.
I would like to refer briefly to the way in which those in Rhodesia are suffering today. We ought to spare a thought for them. I am not just talking of passports being taken away. I am referring to the treatment of persons detained without trial. I am thinking of people like the Rev. Sithole and Joshua Nkomo, men whom I know personally and who wanted to bring about a situation in Rhodesia where liberty would prevail and where Europeans would have as much right to live as Africans. The present illegal régime in Rhodesia is making this impossible.
Under the system, there are severe penalties for offences which, to us, are

trivial. Police dogs are used against African nationals—

Mr. Orme: We hear no one on the opposite benches complaining about that.

Mr. Bottomley: It would encourage me if I could hear those who argue for liberty doing as much to call attention to this sort of behaviour as they are to the need to put down this censure Motion against the Government.
There is a notorious law in Rhodesia, the Rhodesia Law and Maintenance Act, which makes hanging possible for acts of so-called murder. I should think that it should be at this time necessary for us all to be stronger in our application to bring down the illegal régime. The tobacco farmers, who were the backbone of the Rhodesian Front, are in revolt, the drought is much more effective and damaging than we are led to believe. With extra pressure we all ought to join in putting on, it is possible to end the illegal régime in Rhodesia.
I should feel much happier if all hon. Members, on both sides of the House, were making it the major objective to secure the return to standards of law and order and civilised behaviour which is the British heritage—

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: The right hon. Gentleman is a very fine and fair-minded man. Would he refer to some of the other cases of passports being withdrawn, in which passports have been taken away from children and from Mr. Harper? What about them?

Mr. Bottomley: I thought that I had gone a long way to meet the point made by the right hon. Gentleman when I made the appeal both to his colleagues, as well as my colleagues, to consider whether there ought not to be some redress by appeal. If that were so we need not be concerned about individual cases in the way in which they have been highlighted today.
I say this finally, because this is a short debate, although much more could be said. I believe in the best interests of the people of Rhodesia as a whole. For the good and high standards which this House practises we should say to all people of British stock—that goes for Sir Frederick, too—that they should stand by the standards of liberty and conduct


which is the right and tradition of a British holder of a passport.

4.42 p.m.

Mr. John Boyd-Carpenter: I hope that the Commonwealth Secretary will take it as a compliment, because it is sincerely so intended, when I say that to many of us the shock of his announcement came the more sharply because it came from him. During the period in which he has held his extremely difficult office he has certainly given many of us the impression both of good sense and sensibility. Therefore, the fact that he should be Ministerially responsible for an action whose malevolent ineptitude clearly suggests personal intervention by the Prime Minister comes as a shock. It also comes as more of a shock that the right hon. Gentleman should this afternoon seek to justify his action by the sort of speech he made.
We are not trying Sir Frederick Crawford for whether or not—in a position of singular difficulty which hon. Members should thank their stars they have not themselves to occupy—in trying in the difficult situation in Rhodesia to administer in the interests of its shareholders a great international company, he has acted as we would approve. We are not concerned this afternoon about whether he has picked precisely the right path. Opinions may well differ on that. What shocked me was that the Commonwealth Secretary did not seem to appreciate that. What is shocking is that he should be punished for this action in this way.
Make no bones about it, this action of withdrawing Sir Frederick's passport is intended as a penalty and a punishment. And for a director of a great international company it is a very severe punishment. I know the legal pedantries, to quote my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg), about this being a prerogative act. The right hon. Gentleman knows that passports in general are withhold only to prevent someone going abroad. That is not so in this case, because the right hon. Gentleman, in his statement on Thursday, said that he would provide the necessary papers to enable Sir Frederick to go back to

Rhodesia. It is, therefore, quite clear that this is a punishment.
Opinions may differ, on the facts in front of us, as to whether what Sir Frederick is alleged to have done, whether his failure to sign His Excellency's book, whether civilities shown to a guest at a trade fair of which he had been President for six years were right or wrong, but I think that no one in this House could justify for a moment the methods of imposing this penalty. If Sir Frederick has committed an offence against the law, let the right hon. Gentleman put him in front of a court.
If he did that Sir Frederick would have to face precisely formulated charges and clear evidence and he would have the right to be heard—and to be heard at the time, not four days after the decision is taken against him. If he has committed an offence, why does the right hon. Gentleman, who has taken great powers under the Rhodesia Act, not put him on a charge? The right hon. Gentleman knows that Sir Frederick has committed no offence. He is seeking, none the less, to use the old prerogative power in respect of passports to punish him.
Whatever view one takes of the way in which Sir Frederick has conducted himself, that any man, distinguished or obscure, eminent or unknown, should be punished in this way, not by a court of law acting judicially with rights of appeal and in accordance with procedures which are known to the law, but arbitrarily by a political Minister acting on the basis of unpublished lists and unpublished decisions and unknown considerations, seems absolutely intolerable.
What seems worse is that the right hon. Gentleman in his reply to my right hon. Friend the Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) did not address himself to this point at all. The right hon. Gentleman has told us that he proposes to seek the leave of the House to reply at the end of the debate. I hope that in fairness to himself he will tell the House then why he thinks it right to punish in this way a man whom he admits to be guiltless of any legal offence whatever.

Mr. Manuel: Could the right hon. Gentleman explain why he is so scathing in his condemnation of my right hon.


Friend for withdrawing the passport, but did not condemn his right hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, West (Mr. Iain Macleod), who did the very same thing?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: The hon. Gentleman will be aware, if he has studied that case with the closeness which I know he always does, that the withdrawal of the passport in the case of the certain gentlemen concerned was a precaution necessary for law and order and in circumstances which might well have been the preliminary to criminal proceedings. Nobody believes that the right of Sir Frederick Crawford to travel to Rhodesia could have this effect because the right hon. Gentleman has said that he will provide the documents to enable him to go back there. No one believes that his right to travel in other countries is a threat to law and order, nor has the right hon. Gentleman indicated that there are the slightest reasons for seeking to put him on any criminal charge. That is the essence of the case against the right hon. Gentleman.
I do not want to pronounce on how someone in Rhodesia should conduct himself, but the censure by the right hon. Gentleman of those who show even trifling civilities to what, however illegal, is the de facto régime contrasts very vividly with the advice the Prime Minister gave the public services of that country immediately after U.D.I. Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that the Prime Minister said on 11th November, 1965:
It is our view—as I have said; and I believe that the Governor has made this statement in Rhodesia—that it is the duty of public servants to carry on with their jobs…
He went on to say:
I hope that those who are concerned with, say, hospital administration, education, and the normal functioning of Government will feel able to carry on…".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11th November, 1965; Vol. 720, c. 362.]

Mr. Michael Foot: Did the advice of the Prime Minister on that occasion to officials and other people in Rhodesia include a suggestion that they should on all available opportunities lick the boots of Mr. Dupont?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: If the hon. Gentleman has any experience, and I think he has, of public administration, he will realise that it is difficult to carry on in a subordinate capacity in Govern-

ment if one insists on publicly insulting one's superiors. The hon. Gentleman will know perfectly well that one cannot either run a business or, still more, act in a subordinate official capacity unless one is prepared to indulge in those minor courtesies to one's superiors which are the ordinary lubricant of life. The hon. Gentleman knows that perfectly well.
There was one other omission from the right hon. Gentleman's speech. My right hon. Friend asked him about the other cases and said that there were some hundreds of them. On what grounds is the right hon. Gentleman seeking to punish—because I am sure it is so—these people, too? Is it for the same sort of triviality? Is it for the same sort of thing for which he admits he cannot put them on trial before a court of law to face any charge, and is he, for that reason, asking foreign Powers to use their officials to take British passports off British citizens travelling in their country? The right hon. Gentleman is not going to part from this House without telling it a great more about that.
My final point—and this is why I am particularly glad that my right hon. Friend raised this matter—is that the whole atmosphere of this action, with the right hon. Gentleman of all Ministers put up to seek to justify it, not only reeks of malice but stinks of tyranny. For a Government to say that they will punish those who have acted lawfully in the eyes of the law because they have displeased the Government, that they will punish severely political opinions and private actions which are nowhere near a criminal offence, suggests to me that it is not only in Germany that we need fear the uprising of the Nazi spirit.

4.25 p.m.

Sir Dingle Foot: The speech to which the House has just listened from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames, (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) illustrates precisely the point that was made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Bottomley). The right hon. Gentleman was extremely indignant about the invasion of personal liberty which, he says, was involved in the exercise of the Royal prerogative in the case of Sir Frederick Crawford. He made no reference whatever to the invasion of every kind of civil liberty in Southern Rhodesia.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: If the right hon. and learned Gentleman will consult the Motion he will see that it relates to Sir Frederick Crawford. If he has ever heard me speak in a debate on Rhodesia he will know that I have made no defence of any invasions of civil liberty there, but I hope that I am not now committing an offence in being relevant and in order.

Sir Dingle Foot: The right hon. Gentleman said he had made no defence of any invasion of liberty. Has he or have his colleagues ever attacked it?
Take the case of an African leader who represents far more people than does Mr. Smith, Mr. Joshua Nkomo. Mr. Nkomo, who was charged with an offence and was acquitted by a court of law has been detained in a distant detention camp ever since, for the past four years. How rarely, if ever, do we hear any condemnation of that. Hon. Gentlemen are very concerned when an ex-Governor, for whom I have the highest personal regard, has his passport taken away. They never exhibit the slightest concern when the real leaders of the Rhodesian people are locked away, when the right of public meeting is denied and when the whole country lives in fear of intimidation because of the powers to lock up without trial.
Since this matter was raised last week, two issues have been canvassed, both in this House and outside. I want to say a word very briefly about each. The first is whether it is right that a passport should be refused or taken away by the mere ipse dixit of the Executive and that the subject should have no right of appeal or redress. Secondly, there is the question whether the power should have been exercised in this particular case.
We find ourselves here in what has become a very familiar situation. It has become familiar over the past 3½ years, ever since the present Government assumed office. We constantly find hon. Members opposite expressing great concern at a state of affairs which they did nothing to correct over 13 years and which indeed they accepted and defended when they were in office.
Last Thursday we heard the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg), who is an

expert in selective indignation, ask whether there was not
once a time in this country when a man was innocent until proved guilty.
and he went on to ask my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South (Mr. Philip Noel-Baker):
Will he also point out to the right hon. Gentleman that the refusal to publish any reasons, however much this may be said to be in the public interest, is to reduce this country to the level of a police State?"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 9th May 1968; vol. 764, c. 628.]
That was the general proposition.
This question of the issue, withholding or impounding of passports has been considered on a number of occasions during recent years. It was considered, for example, in another place on 16th June, 1958. When I looked up the debate I also looked up the membership of the Government in that other place. I found that it included the right hon. Gentleman who was then Lord Hailsham and the Lord President of the Council. There was also the right hon. Gentleman who now sits for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home), who was there as Commonwealth Secretary. On that occasion the precise point was raised. Viscount Stansgate asked this question:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the protection afforded by the possession of a valid British passport is the normal right of a British-born subject either in the United Kingdom or the Colonies; and for what, if any, reasons it is held that a passport can be withheld or withdrawn?
The then Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, in the presence of the right hon. Gentleman who now represents Kinross and West Perthshire and who intervened in the exchanges on that occasion, said:
No British subject has a legal right to a passport. The grant of a United Kingdom passport is a Royal prerogative exercised through Her Majesty's Ministers and, in particular, the Foreign Secretary.
The Foreign Secretary has the power to withhold or withdraw a passport at his discretion, although in practice such power is exercised only very rarely and in very exceptional cases.
and went on to describe some of the categories of cases in which this power was exercised.
The same thought which crossed the mind of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for St. Marylebone last week obviously crossed the mind


of their Lordships, because Lord Strabolgi said:
how, in that case, can you find a man guilty unless you try him?
The reply on that occasion by the Earl of Gosford, in the presence no doubt of the right hon. Gentleman, was:
My Lords, there is no suggestion of guilt in the withdrawal of a passport, the issue of which is a Royal prerogative."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, House of Lords, 16th June, 1958; Vol. 209, c. 860–861.]
There was no suggestion then from either of the right hon. Gentlemen—

Mr. Quintin Hogg: If the right hon. and learned Gentleman is proceeding from that, can he not hoist it in that what is objected to is a use of the prerogative as a punishment, without trial, and not the use of it as a protection.

Sir Dingle Foot: That was not the right hon. and learned Gentleman's point last week. He suggested that the use of the Royal prerogative without giving the man an opportunity to be heard or telling him the grounds was a grave invasion of liberty. Precisely this issue was raised, presumably in the presence of the right hon. and learned Member and of the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire, in the case to which I have referred. Not only was the system accepted by them. It was never suggested, by them at any rate, that any change was desirable.
Of course such cases happened in those days. My right hon. Friend has given examples in Kenya in 1960. It happened not infrequently that passports were withdrawn for political reasons—not often, of course, in this country. But it did often happen in colonial and dependent territories and from time to time the matter was raised in this House, but never, I am sure, by any right hon. or hon. Member opposite. I can give a number of examples, some of which I raised myself. I will content myself with one.
In November, 1956, there was being held a Socialist conference in Bombay, to which delegates were asked from different countries in the Afro-Asian world. Three African delegates were invited to attend. One was from what was then Nyasaland, one was from what was then Northern Rhodesia and one was from Uganda. It could not have been an accident that all three of them in their

three different territories were refused passports to proceed to that conference.
Protests were made in this House. I raised one myself. It was all, of course, without the slightest avail. Therefore, in the following year I introduced a Bill on the subject. It was called the Immigation and Passports Bill. I suggested that, if
anyone was declared a prohibited immigrant by any Government in a British colonial or dependent territory, whenever his passport was withheld or withdrawn, there should be a right of recourse to an advisory committee, where he would have the chance to state his case and of knowing what was alleged against him. I got leave to introduce that Bill and that, of course, was as far as it went because, according to procedures which we all know, it was always blocked by an hon. Member from the party opposite.
But the matter was raised again in a different context. Later the same year, we had the Tribunals and Inquiries Act. Some of us then in opposition felt that that Measure did not go nearly far enough to protect the liberties of the subject. We thought that there should be a further safeguard. That safeguard has, in fact, now been given by the present Government in setting up the office of Parliamentary Commissioner—something which the last Government refused to do. In debate on the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, two of us, Sir Frank Soskice, as he then was, and I, drew specific attention to the questiton of passports and of their being arbitrarily withdrawn without any reason being given or without the person concerned even being heard by the other party involved.
In this matter, as in others, Labour Members of Parliament have shown themselves far more concerned with the liberty of the subject than have hon. Members opposite. Let them search the records. They will find not one single case in all these years when the Conservative Party was in office when any hon. Member opposite every expressed the slightest concern about the arbitrary refusal or withdrawal of a passport. Yet that was going on and their attention was constantly directed to it.
I have put down an Amendment to the Motion before the House, which is not being called, but I will express my view that the question of passports ought


now to be reviewed. Originally, the passport was simply a facility. It made it easier to travel. Now the passport has become something almost different. It has become, in certain circumstances, almost an instrument of despotism, because it can be granted or withheld. For example, the South African Government would not allow Chief Lutholi a passport even to travel abroad to get the Nobel Peace Prize. That is a police State.
The point I make is that the passport has become something very different from what is was in earlier days because, although one can leave this country without a passport and is entitled to return to it without one, one will not get very far. Therefore, if a passport is refused or taken away, there should be a right of recourse to an advisory committee or some other independent authority.
I come now to the case of Sir Frederick Crawford. I want fully to join in the tributes paid to his career of public service. I have known him for many years. In the days when he was Governor of Uganda I frequently met him on a variety of occasions in Entebbe and London. When he was first appointed Governor of Uganda, he was regarded by many of the African population with considerable suspicion because he had come from Kenya, where he was Deputy-Governor during the Mau Mau emergency. That suspicion very rapidly passed away and it should be recorded that Sir Frederick went a long way to repair in Uganda the damage which had been done a year or two earlier by the act of incredible high-handedness and folly when the Conservative Government exiled the Kabaka of Buganda—something which no one would defend now, although, of course, all hon. Members opposite supported it at the time.
But the fact that Sir Frederick Crawford is a man of great distinction with an admirable record does not mean that he should be afforded more favourable treatment than anyone else. He should be setting an example. When one hears about the Rhodesian Trade Fair and sees the photograph published in a newspaper last Sunday, showing him appearing with the head of the illegal régime receiving the guests together, that must be interpreted as a gesture of sympathy with the unlawful régime.
Again, only a day or two ago, Sir Frederick was asked questions on the radio. Referring to the Trade Fair, he said:
…there were Cabinet Ministers there, the Officer administering the Government, Mr. Dupont, our Prime Minister and Mrs. Smith…
I call attention to the phrase, "our Prime Minister". However distinguished they may be, those who, on public occasions, appear to give countenance to the Queen's enemies cannot complain if they are prevented from travelling about the world on British passports.
But there is rather more than that involved. There is a matter of general policy. In dealing with the Rhodesian question, I have no doubt about the intentions of Her Majesty's Government, but that confidence is not universally shared, particularly throughout the Afro-Asian countries. It is sometimes suspected, however unjustly, that we are not in earnest in seeking to bring about an end to the rebellion in Rhodesia. It is because of that feeling and because we wish to make sanctions more effective that there has been placed before the Security Council, for early debate, a new resolution on behalf of Her Majesty's Government.
This refers to persons travelling on Southern Rhodesian passports and demands that all nations should refuse to recognise those passports. It goes on to urge members of the United Nations
Take all possible measures to prevent the entry into their territories of persons whom they have reason to believe to be ordinarily resident in Southern Rhodesia and whom they have reason to believe to have furthered or encouraged or to be likely to further or encourage the unlawful actions of the illegal régime in Southern Rhodesia or any activities which are calculated to evade any measures decided upon in this resolution…
or in an earlier resolution.
If we are to ask other nations to exercise their judgment in individual cases, we must exercise our own judgment. We have to give a lead. I believe that this resolution is long overdue. It is a fantastic state of affairs that when there is a rebellion against the Crown anybody can buy an airline ticket from this country to Salisbury and back again, or that travel facilities for all the people concerned should be freely available to the outside world.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home: Does not the right hon. and learned Gentleman think, if he recommends these things, that the Government should lay down rules, so that people know exactly what they should and should not do and are not caught in a foreign country and unable to move?

Sir Dingle Foot: I should have thought that the rules were clear enough, without being spelled out, that if somebody goes out of his way to express by word or gesture sympathy with the unlawful régime he comes within the rules. I should not have thought that that presented any difficulty. I do not, however, disagree with the right hon. Gentleman. The more clearly this can be spelled out, the better, and if it is spelled out quite clearly some advantage will have been gained from this Motion.
I believe that a very heavy responsibility rests on right hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition Front Bench, including the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire. Throughout the past months they have constantly painted in this country a wholly false picture of the Rhodesian situation. When the right hon. Gentleman returned from Salisbury a few weeks ago he wrote an article in a Sunday newspaper in which he said:
Rhodesia is a country in which it is possible to establish a non-racial society on the Continent of Africa.
On the face of it, that is a quite unexceptionable statement. But what did he mean? He meant that it was possible to establish a non-racial society by agreement with the Smith régime.
That is a sheer illusion. I shall not go over all the steps again—the Law and Order Maintenance Act, which caused Sir Robert Tredgold to resign, the suppression of public meetings, the locking-up of African leaders, the abolition of almost every form of civil liberty—but shall refer simply to an article by Mr. Ian Waller, in last Sunday's Sunday Telegraph. He referred to a conversation he had with Mr. Smith and said, after mentioning the régime's economic difficulties:
I believe it was his desire to break out of what, in the long run, is the road to ruin, that drove Mr. Smith, when I interviewed him, to state what he has never said so categorically before: 'No majority rule for a hundred years.'

There spoke the true voice of the Rhodesian Front. Every attempt at negotiation has broken down at the same point, whether the previous Government or this Government were concerned. When the point arose where they had to contemplate the transfer of power in any degree to the African majority the negotiations came to an end.
At the end of the article Mr. Waller referred to a further interview he had with Sir Robert Tredgold, who does not give support to the régime. He said:
It was Sir Robert Tredgold, the former Chief Justice of Rhodesia, who put his country's dilemma most clearly to me. He asked: 'Are the Africans being given the hope and expectation of reasonable political advancement without resort to revolutionary means?' His answer was a resounding 'no', and he left me in no doubt what he thought the consequences would be if Rhodesia's political leaders refused this advancement.
If those consequences are realised, a very large part of the responsibility will rest on right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Bench opposite.

5.12 p.m.

Mr. David Steel: I very much welcome the opportunity of following the right hon. and learned Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot). I intend to be brief and keep very much within the strict limits of the Motion. I shall not try to deal with the wider issues, although I wholly agree with what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said.
I and my colleagues who were
present in the Chamber last Thursday afternoon were greatly troubled after the exchanges with the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Affairs. We were very disturbed that this arbitrary action had been taken and that, apparently, no reasons could be given for it and that no appeal machinery existed. I therefore put down a Question, which was answered in a Written Reply yesterday, to find out on how many occasions since 1951 passports of British citizens have been impounded. The Answer was 2,400. If anything, this deepened my concern that we have apparently allowed this procedure to go on year after year.
The fact that the Secretary of State was able to demonstrate quite adequately in his speech today that the procedure
had been adopted by his Conservative predecessors in Ministerial office made no difference to our view of the unfortunate


nature of the procedure which has been used by successive Governments. I hope that, if nothing else comes from this debate, we shall at least hear from the right hon. Gentleman that considerable thought has been applied to the machinery whereby we impound people's passports arbitrarily without necessarily giving reasons. After all, not every one will be an ex-colonial Governor, the reasons for impounding whose passport may well be discussed on the Floor of the House.
I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will consider an appeal procedure. One which might be appropriate was that used during the war in the case of British citizens detained under Regulation 18B, under which, if I remember rightly, they had a right of appeal to a panel of persons of judicial standing, and though this appeal, for obvious reasons, was held in private—

Mr. Hogg: I do not want to hold up a very interesting and valuable speech, but I think I am right in saying that in those circumstances the committee was only advisory and the responsibility remained with the Secretary of State. I would not consider that an adequate machinery for this purpose.

Mr. Steel: If it were purely advisory, I agree that it would not be sufficiently strong machinery to deal with the problem.
An appeal machinery of this kind, clearly cannot be an ordinary appeal before the courts, because possibly on occasions the standard of evidence required would not stand up in an open court of law, or on occasions where matters of security were involved it would not be in the country's interest for the evidence to be brought out in open court. A special kind of machinery must be adopted. I hope that as a result of this episode the Government will be willing to consider this, and that in future we shall have some form of machinery known to everybody and to which everybody can have resort if their passports are taken away.
We had two doubts on the Government's action in this matter. The first was that no reasons had been given. That doubt has been removed this afternoon, because the Commonwealth Secretary gave us the reasons quite clearly, and it

is open to the House and the general public to agree or disagree with the Government on the merits of the case. At least the reasons have been given and, therefore, our doubts on that score have been removed.
The second reason for doubt as to whether we should support the Government tonight was the fact that no appeal procedure existed, but I must point out to the Opposition that there is no mention of this in their Motion. They are dealing strictly with the narrow question whether or not, on the existing procedure, the Government were right or wrong to remove Sir Frederick's passport.
I now turn to that question. The Government's action was taken under a policy which was agreed and made clear in the House after U.D.I. It was accepted on both sides of the House that it could well be that as part of the sanctions policy people would have their passports removed. The three instances which the Commonwealth Secretary gave us this afternoon seemed to me to be reasonable grounds on which we could suppose that Sir Frederick Crawford was giving aid and comfort to the illegal régime, the first being that he acted as host to the Prime Minister, to Mr. Smith. I must say that other people have acted as host to Mr. Smith, including our own Prime Minister, so that, though that reason could be adduced, it did not strike me as overwhelming.
Far more important and serious is the fact that Sir Frederick Crawford acted as host the following year to Mr. Dupont. Had he been an ordinary businessman unused to the etiquette of diplomacy or to moving in circles associated with the subtleties of loyalty to the Queen and all that that involves, the incident might have been passed over as a misunderstanding or piece of thoughtlessness on Sir Frederick's part. But this was not so. As an ex-colonial Governor, Sir Frederick must have known what he was doing when, as President of the Trade Fair, he invited Mr. Dupont to open it and when he went about introducing him to people and addressing him with the formality of "His Excellency". This was the man whom the rebel régime had appointed to usurp the authority of the Queen's representative in Rhodesia, and Sir Frederick's action was a very serious matter.
It was a serious matter, too, that he attended the second anniversary celebrations of the U.D.I., something which appeared to give recognition to the act of U.D.I. a; a legal act of independence.
Those are two substantial charges against Sir Frederick's behaviour as a former colonial Governor. The opportunity given to him this morning, to which the right hon. Gentleman referred, to declare his loyalty to the Crown and to renounce any support for or recognition of the illegal régime was perfectly fair, and his decision to turn it down seems to me to support the view that the Government's action was justified.
Bearing in mind all these facts, I must say that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home), in describing Sir Frederick Crawford as a liberal-minded man, made the gravest misuse of the word "liberal" that I have heard for a long time, even from members of the Conservative Party. As I said last Thursday, one is entitled to expect from a man who was Her Majesty's personal representative and the Government's representative, first, in the Seychelles and then in Uganda, not the same code of conduct but a higher code of conduct than one might expect from an ordinary wayward British businessman who happened to do some foolish things while in Rhodesia.
In fact, so far from that higher standard of conduct having been forthcoming, there has been a pretty low level of conduct indeed. I hope, therefore, that the Opposition, having had the reasons given and having explored the matter in this debate, will agree to withdraw their Motion tonight. I say that because, although I have never sympathised in the slightest with the policies of the Conservative Party, I have always accepted that as a party it had certain attributes—the qualities of honour, loyalty to the Crown and devotion to the maintenance of the rule of law.
If the Opposition do not withdraw the Motion, but force it to a Division, they will instead be showing themselves to be a party of dishonour and treachery, and my hon. Friends and I shall have no hesitation in supporting the Government in the Lobby.

5.23 p.m.

Mr. David Ginsburg: I shall make a short speech on lines similar to the one just made by the hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. David Steel). This Motion and debate throw up two quite separate issues. First, there is the issue of Rhodesia policy, on which I fully support the Government and my right hon. Friend. I only say in passing that, as my right hon. Friend must know, it is a very long road which he will have to follow, and the present case may well be only the first of many such difficult problems.
The second issue is the question of the right of appeal. This goes far wider than Rhodesia. It raises a basic issue of civil liberty. As has become clear from two of the speeches made from this side in the debate so far, the passport is no longer a document of convenience. The holding of a passport is a basic right of any citizen. One could go even further and say that the issue of a passport gives rise to great obligations and duties. A man was hanged in 1945 for treachery in relation to offences germane to the holding of a passport. This is, therefore, no unimportant or academic topic.
My concern is primarily about the great power which is given to Ministers without adequate public accountability. This is no criticism of my right hon. Friend the Commonwealth Secretary, whom we all respect. It is just as much a criticism of previous Governments as of this. One appreciates that when dealing with questions of this kind it is not always possible for Ministers to give their reasons. One wonders even in the present case whether my right hon. Friend has been totally frank with the House and given all his reasons.
In such a situation, when a Minister cannot give all his reasons in the public interest—my right hon. Friend was quite clear about that on Thursday—the House requires that there be an additional safeguard introduced. There is need for an appeal machinery, though whether of a statutory or advisory kind we can argue later. We on this side have nothing to be ashamed of in this regard. My right hon. Friend will recall that in 1956, when we were in opposition, the Labour Party conference debated this issue, and a moving speech was made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly


(Mr. James Griffiths). We then expressed certain views about the need for an appeals machinery to deal with the use by Ministers of these exceptional powers.
It is, perhaps, worth recapitulating some of the precedents which exist. There has already been reference to the procedure under Regulation 18B. Now, with reference to the speech of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot), it is worth recalling that it was a Labour Home Secretary who, in the exercise of his judgment, recommended the establishment of such an appeal procedure and who took the unpopular course of releasing Sir Oswald Mosley from detention at that time. Also, we have the precedent of the late Lord Attlee's action in instituting the "Three Wise Men" appeal machinery to deal with Communists and Fascists in the Civil Service. If my right hon. Friend wanted a machinery readily to hand to deal with the problem which he has just encountered, the "Three Wise Men" might be well suited to deal with such questions if the numbers involved were not too large.
A few weeks ago, we had the recommendations of the Wilson Committee and the suggestion that there should be an appeal machinery for Commonwealth immigrants who, though they might claim to hold British passports, were refused entry to this country. The Home Secretary has assured us that that appeals machinery will be instituted.
There are many other areas, apart from the one we are now discussing, in which the arrangements are far from ideal. The question of aliens and their deportation comes to mind. In that connection, big issues have been raised and debates have taken place in the House in regard to the exercise of this exceptional prerogative by the Home Secretary. There is a lot to be said for an appeals machinery to cover not only such cases as the present one but others as well.
I have no wish to be melodramatic. This is a big issue. Although all of us in the House trust my right hon. Friend personally with these exceptional powers, there are many people to whom one would not care to entrust such powers. Speaking hypothetically, I should not, for example, after a recent speech, like to entrust the passport of a Commonwealth

immigrant to the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell). That would be giving him very exceptional power. I remind some of my hon. Friends that there are dangers here not just for people on the extreme Right but for people on the Left and the far Left. Hypothetically, this exceptional power could be used by a Minister of the Crown, for example, to by-pass many of the provisions of Commonwealth immigrant legislation. One could have a very illiberal state of affairs.
Because the Government over Rhodesia rightly stand for very big moral and political principles, often in the face of great difficulty and great unpopularity, it is equally right that on this side of the House we should ask them to stand by principles of civil liberty which are equally vital and equally important.

5.30 p.m.

Sir Derek Walker-Smith: In spite of the glosses and palliatives sought to be put on this matter by the speeches of right hon. Members opposite, I remain of the opinion that we have in the action of the Government a situation which is serious, unsatisfactory and potentially dangerous, a situation inimical to the rule of law and the basic rights of individual liberty. It is no argument to defend that on the basis that there is arbitrary action also in Rhodesia. That argument is the classic case of the principle, "By Beelzebub, cast out Beezlebub". I prefer to invoke more respectable aid.
The elements which are contrary
to the rule of law are judgment without open investigation, condemnation without trial, and punishment without proof. All these elements were demonstrably present in this case. Sir Frederick had no more right of hearing before he was deprived of his passport than if we had been living in the days of the Star Chamber, and there was even less attempt to give him any form of quasi-judicial hearing than apparently, we now see, was accorded to the traitor Philby.
The only hearing, if one could so call it, in this case was the interview this morning with the Secretary of State, after the deprivation had been made; and it is not very satisfactory to have the hearing after judgment pronounced and sentence passed. He was then confronted with


these undertakings of which, apparently, he had not been given any notice, or any prior right to examine. These things strike at the foundations of our constitutional edifice and at the rule of law and there is therefore a clear and imperative duty on the House of Commons, as the traditional guardian of these principles, closely to examine the Government's purported justification for this course of action.
Three main grounds of justification are put forward: first, that no punishment is involved in the deprivation of a passport; secondly, that the matter is within the prerogative and discretion of the Crown, that is to say, the Government, and that therefore normal constitutional principles do not apply and, thirdly, that the information available to the Government in this case was sufficient to justify their arbitrary action on the ground that Sir Frederick was giving aid and comfort to the régime. I do not believe that any of these three justifications is valid.
I need say very little about the first. To say that no punishment is involved in the deprivation of a passport is surely a sophistry at best in present conditions. For a businessman to be deprived of his passport, of his right to travel, adds a pecuniary penalty which must clearly have the substance, if not the form, of punishment.
I pass to the second justification, on which the main constitutional issue turns. The Government appear to say that because this is a matter of prerogative, the citizen has no right of inquiry or redress and Parliament no right of explanation or interrogation. Is this correct? Can this be correct in the second half of the 20th century? Parliament must not be too awed, too mesmerised, too intimidated, when the high priests of the Executive chant the incantation of prerogative. Ministers must not be encouraged to think that they have only to erect a notice-board, "Domain of Prerogative—Trespassers will be prosecuted" and they will be able to take arbitrary action without examination.

Mr. Winnick: rose—

Sir D. Walker-Smith: I had better not give way. This is a very short debate and the hon. Gentleman is a frequent contributor, both standing and sedentary, to the proceedings of the House.
Parliament must concern itself with the acts of the Executive, even if they are taken within the prerogative, and see that the shield of the prerogative is not used to protect arbitrary or oppressive acts. After all, that is why we are here, and that is why the Stuarts are not here. Blackstone says that the prerogative is enjoyed by virtue of the common law, although out of its ordinary course. It is created and limited by the common law and Parliament therefore has the duty of seeing that these limits are not exceeded.
It is, of course, true that passports are traditionally within the sphere of the prerogative. It is also true that there are cases when the security of the nation requires secrecy of procedure, but to say that because of this every passport transaction is to be done on an arbitrary basis, veiled in secrecy and protected by privilege, is to put a dangerous weapon into the hands of the Executive.
It is perfectly true that the function of passports has radically changed. As The Times said in an excellent leader this morning, the function has been revolutionised. Little more than 50 years years ago a person could travel without let or hindrance wherever he wanted, provided that he was not actually wanted by the police. In the words of the document, it was only an additional facility to help the traveller get such assistance and protection as may be necessary. But today it is a sine qua non for travel outside his own country. As Halsbury puts it,
the possession of a passport is now"—
showing that this is only a recent development—
almost always required by the authorities to enable a person to enter a country".
That being so, to deprive a person of his right to a passport is not to withdraw a facility, but to deny by prerogative action one of the rights which distinguishes a citizen of a free country from a subject of a totalitarian country.
The theory of the prerogative, of this limited prerogative which is all that is known to our constitution, does not and should not support arbitrary action when secrecy and executive informality go beyond the imperative needs of security. The whole procedure for passports requires review and revision in the light


of these changed circumstances, to take account of the rights of the individual as well as the security of the State, and to put both before the administrative convenience of the Executive.
I come to the third justification—that the circumstances in this case justify it. Until this afternoon, we were very much in the dark about what the circumstances were. On Thursday, the right hon. Gentleman thought it sufficient to say that he was satisfied, having studied the papers, that it would not be in the interests of the country for Sir Frederick to be given permission to travel abroad. I do not think that we can take that on the ipse dixit of a Minister, even one so personally respected as the right hon. Gentleman. We now know a little more.
We have been given three reasons which were not the reasons why the passport was taken away. First we were told on Thursday that it was not because of his presence at the Trade Fair. Then they were told by the Minister in another place that it was not because he was a resident director of Anglo-American. Thirdly, we have been told this afternoon that it is not because he has been sanction-breaking. Instead, we have been given various reasons, and I will certainly study them in the OFFICIAL REPORT tomorrow with the closeness of attention that they deserve.
Some may be weightier than others, but some are incredibly light ánd trivial. I took some down while the right hon. Gentleman was speaking. He refrained from signing the Governor's Book; he took part in social and charitable occasions at which Mr. Smith and Mr. Dupont were present. If it was not an offence to take part in the Trade Fair when they were present, how on earth can it be said to be an offence to take part in a charitable occasion? Then he made a speech, apparently at the Trade Fair, saying that the Rhodesian economy was standing up to sanctions. I read that in the works of eminent economists in the most respectable newspapers of the land.
What worries me most was the right hon. Gentleman's words:
He adopted a course of behaviour which gave every appearance of treating the regime as an equal.
On Thursday the right hon. Gentleman assented to the proposition of the right

hon. and learned Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot), that those who give, or appear to give, aid and comfort to the régime cannot expect to travel on British passports. Appear to whom and on what basis? Appear, presumably to the Minister, who takes to himself the absolute and unregulated power of confiscation, to be exercised on mere impression, without tested evidence.
The words "aid and comfort" are themselves drawn from the Treason Act—the gravest offence in our criminal calendar—an offence which has to be strictly proved by express testimony of overt acts. These are the words being bandied about, the words on which people can be convicted, apparently without charge made, and on this sort of evidence. All these things give rise to the greatest disquiet. Where is it to end? Not with Sir Frederick, not necessarily with the residents in Rhodesia. If, as a matter of prerogative, the Government can exercise these powers, on so subjective and untested an impression of aid and comfort, then they can do the same to the holders of British passports resident in this country.
If that doctrine is correct there cannot be any distinction either in law or logic, between the two. What is sauce for the Rhodesian will be sauce for the British holder of a passport, and very bitter sauce it is. What would be the position of those who like to put up stickers on the back of the car saying "Support Rhodesia"? Will not they be said to be giving aid and comfort? [Interruption.] How about people who write to friends and relatives in Rhodesia, saying rude things about the Prime Minister? What about people who say that sanctions have failed? What about hon. and right hon. Gentlemen who may vote against the continuing folly of sanctions? What about all those millions in the country who support them, and who reject this doctrine put forward by the Government?
There would be a position where the Government would be entitled, if they so wished, to deprive a majority of the country of their passports on the diktat of what is now patently a minority Government. That is the reductio ad absurdum, showing the lack of logic and the basic fallacy and inequity of the Government's action.
The Government's three attempts at justification are all unjustified and unfounded. Of course, Governments should be vested with special powers for dealing with matters affecting the security of the realm. That is in conformity with the time-honoured principle of salus populi suprema lex. History shows however that these powers can be abused; and history shows that they are most susceptible to abuse by weak and unpopular Governments desperately seeking to underpin the authority for which they have no support in public esteem or popular will. That is the position today, and it is one which this House should unhesitatingly and unequivocally condemn.

5.47 p.m.

Mr. R. T. Paget: I agree with the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) with regard to the change in the nature of a passport. At one time a passport was simply a request by one sovereign to another to give special facilities to a traveller. It did not affect the right to travel. Now it has become a condition of that right of travel, the right to come and go which is recognised in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It has become a pretty fundamental thing. By custom, and after all our constitutional law is in the main custom, the rights or of Governments to withhold this liberty to come and go has been limited to two sets of circumstances. One has been where it is desired to prevent someone from travelling because if he does there may be a danger to the security of this Government or perhaps a Colonial Government. That applied rather obviously in the case of Mr. Oginga Odinga when we were the Government of Kenya.
The other case is where we want to prevent a gentleman travelling because we suspect him of a crime; we have perhaps charged him and given him bail and for the moment do not want him to go out of our jurisdiction. There is a slight addendum to that principle where it is a question of removing a child from the jurisdiction of a court. The one thing which was very clear indeed was that this power of withholding or withdrawing a passport was not something which could legitimately be used as a means of punishing people for doing things of which the Government do not approve.
My right hon. Friend, in his astonishingly able speech, gave away every ground upon which his conduct could he justified. He said, quite plainly, that Sir Frederick was not charged with sanction breaking and that it had nothing to do with that. He went so far as to say that that was equally true of Anglo-American. My right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Bottomley), whom I tried to interrupt, seemed to suggest that by investing Rhodesian funds in Rhodesia Anglo-American was doing something wrong and seeking to promote exports. The mine in question cannot be in production for two years, so the export aspect of this does not seem very obvious. There is no question of crime.
What seemed to put my right hon. Friend furthest out of court of all was this question of a declaration. If there were a legal necessity, if there were a security necessity, even if there were a sanction necessity, it would not be removed by that declaration. To me, the declaration stank of a confession. As has been said, it was the kind of thing which is asked of people in communist proceedings. The return of one's ordinary and lawful rights depends on one humiliating oneself publicly. If Sir Frederick Crawford had consented to this it would have been a public humiliation for reward, the reward being the return to him of the civil right of every English citizen.

Mr. Hooley: rose—

Mr. Paget: I am sorry; it is a very short debate.
In these circumstances, I find it impossible to support it in this case, but I would go a little further on the wider issues. Miss Elspeth Huxley, in a remarkable letter in The Times today, drew a distinction between the legitimate objects and the illegitimate objects of our Rhodesian policy. The legitimate object is the advancement of the Rhodesian African to the point at which, as a majority, he becomes responsible for the government of his own country. This is something which I have supported all my life. It had nothing to do with this issue.
In the last conversation on the telephone, between my right hon. Friend the


Prime Minister and Mr. Smith, the Prime Minister promised Mr. Smith that if he would spare him the embarrassment of a declaration of independence we would forego all our reserve powers under the 1961 Constitution and would at no time interfere in the working of that Constitution. That was a Constitution which allowed the Rhodesian Front to give a permanent majority to seats in Parliament reserved for white electors. So much for our Prime Minister's interest in African advancement.
Equally it is absurd to say that sanctions—not as a means of pressure in the early stages to promote negotiation, but to wreck the economy and promote unemployment—are in the interests of the Rhodesian Africans, because any policy of promoting unemployment hurts the weakest and poorest in the community, and in Rhodesia that is the Africans. Least of all do I find it attractive that there should be gloating at the terrible drought which has been hitting Rhodesia and hurting Rhodesia and the Africans whom I know and love. To think that this is the occasion on which we should take that as our excuse on humanitarian grounds for going to the rescue of a Rhodesian! Instead, we have had the illegitimate ground—the ground of legality. What about Nigeria, where a Government of unlawful origin is engaged in a war of genocide in which more people have been killed than the whole of the Vietnam war. What about Zanzibar? What about Uganda? What about Ghana? Every one of those countries we recognise, and I believe rightly, because a Government is entitled to be recognised when it is in effective control within its area and looks as though it will last.
If those conditions are valid in the four countries which I have mentioned, certainly in Rhodesia there is a régime which is entitled to recognition as a lawful Government. It is in effective control. It is firmly established—far more firmly established than the Governments in any of the other countries. In the case of colonial rebellion, the colonial Power may not lawfully refuse recognition when the conditions have been complied with and when the colonial power is plainly impotent to reimpose her authority. If at that point the colonial Power continues to harass, it is acting contrary to

international law. I believe that that is the position today. It is we and not the Rhodesians who are acting unlawfully.

5.55 p.m.

Mr. Michael Hamilton: This is a short debate and I wish to speak only a few minutes.
Some very hard things have been said
about Sir Frederick Crawford by the Commonwealth Secretary. I do not know much about Sir Frederick personally, but when I hear things of that sort being said I find myself wishing that he were present in the Chamber and able to answer them. What I wish to say concerns the activity of building up lists and of impounding passports. I find this more than distateful. It reminds me a little of the lists of collaborators which were compiled in France 25 years ago and when wretched girls who spent evenings with German soldiers had their heads shaven.
It is not on humanitarian grounds that I object to this practice. My objection to it is that it is an indication that the Government are fiddling with minor matters while Rome burns. It is yet further evidence, if it were needed, that the Government are only tinkering with the Rhodesian problem. The game of retaining people's passports is rather like Lord North's insistence on retaining the duty on tea. The Minister will remember that the duty was 3d. a pound and that it cost us the American colonies.
The tragedy of the Rhodesian situation is not so much that she has gone off the rails, although I should be the first to agree that she has gone off the rails. To me the tragedy is that she has gone off the rails at a moment when this country is so sadly lacking in even the rudiments of statesmanship. I absolve the Commonwealth Secretary from that. For him we all have great personal respect. After all, the Parliament of this country earned for itself the proud title of Mother of Parliaments, and when we have an erring daughter, as we have in Rhodesia, adopting high moral attitudes does not bring her home. We do not bring her home by lifting the passports of her leading citizens. We do not bring her home by nattering about her misdeeds in the market place of the United Nations. Rhodesia, be it said, is a young country and, in terms of population, a small country. Righteous indignation and


censorious attitudes will not put her back on the rails. It will need statesmanship, tolerance and magnanimity.
I was in Rhodesia in a private capacity for a few days only last month. I did not meet any members of the Administration. I did the normal things which any of us visiting that country might do. I had a look at the cathedral, which recently had an extension added. I was proud to find that my constituents in Salisbury, Wiltshire, made a small contribution to it.
I went to the game reserve 15 miles outside the city and photographed the animals. I saw the huge sheds to which the right hon. Gentleman referred earlier where the unsold tobacco crop is stored.
On the Saturday afternoon I went to the Glamis sports stadium. I was one of 5,000 or 6,000 spectators. The occasion was the conferment of the Freedom of the City of Salisbury on Mr. Ian Smith. The sun shone—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]—and Boy Scouts handed out programmes. There were two bands and a mayoral procession and ice creams—[An HON. MEMBER: "What was for tea?"] It was the same as any summer Saturday afternoon function to which any right hon. or hon. Member might go. I admit I was conscious that there were no Africans in the crowd, despite the free spectacle. I would also be the first to admit there was a curiously high proportion of children there. A whole section of the grandstand had been set apart for them. Schools had been warned well in advance not to hold their sports days that afternoon.
Mr. Smith spoke for 20 minutes or so. There was no reference in what he said to the United Kingdom or to any other country. He dwelt really on his links with the City of Salisbury and on the fact that his father had ridden races on the local racetrack near by. He made only two political points: first, the intention of ending all Press censorship; and, secondly, concerning the constitutional report which had just come into his hands and was to be published four days later he mentioned that it had 179 pages, several appendices, and that it would give food for thought and discussion and argument during the months ahead.
If it is any reassurance to hon. Gentlemen taking part in the debate, I have

never counted myself an admirer of Mr. Smith's. That has applied during U.D.I. and during my recent visit. But it must be said that he spoke that afternoon with great moderation and restraint, and there was no defiance in his political comments.
Certainly I deplore the situation into which Rhodesia has placed herself, but I came back more convinced than ever before that it should not be beyond the wit of man to achieve a settlement. Therefore, I beg the Minister to turn his thoughts away from impounding passports to more constructive matters in this frightful problem. I realise it is difficult, but I also think that it has not been well handled.
I agree with the Commonwealth Secretary that one of the few men to emerge from this whole tawdry business with enhanced stature is the Governor. He has shown himself to be a man with unlimited reserves of courage and endurance. I agree with my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) when he said that we on these benches have a warm regard for the Commonwealth Secretary personally. But, with all deference to him, I feel he should not be wasting his precious time compiling lists. Rhodesia is but a few hours' flying time from here and it is there that he ought to be. Let him take with him the Attorney-General or the Lord Chancellor—somebody who understands constitutional law—and let him be enlightened and original by taking with him a nominee of Her Majesty's Opposition and also a nominee of the Liberal Party. Let him collect this negotiating team together quickly and fly out there and start work.
I am convinced that the door is still open for negotiation. The climate in Rhodesia at this time of year is perfect. I hope that he will consider doing this soon and that he and his team will stay out there as long as need be. We here will wish him every success.

6.5 p.m.

Mr. Roy Roebuck: In the interests of brevity I will not traverse the whole argument deployed by the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Michael Hamilton). There are two points about his speech on which I should like to comment. First, his idea of statesmanship appears to be that one should turn


a blind eye to the illegal act of independence and all the evils which have flowed from it, including the desire of the Smith regime to keep human beings from expressing what they feel about the manner in which their lives should be run for the next 100 years.
Secondly, the Attorney-General, together with other Members of Her Majesty's Government, have already tried on several occasions to reach an honourable accommodation with the Smith regime, but on each occasion they have been let down by those people. I have come to the conclusion that they are not persons to be trusted and that the only way in which we can look after our responsibilities there is by a further strengthening of sanctions, so that the business community in Southern Rhodesia will realise that it must reach a proper, sensible and legal accommodation with this Parliament which is responsible for all the people of Southern Rhodesia.
When my right hon. Friend the Commonwealth Secretary came to the Dispatch Box at Question Time last week, I felt that he came with both hands tied behind his back. I am delighted that he has appeared before us today with whatever encumbrances he had removed, and that he "spilled the beans". Certainly, Sir Frederick Crawford can make no complaint about that. Nor, indeed, can the hon. Members of Her Majesty's Opposition. Sir Frederick Crawford has created a great hoo-ha in the public prints about this matter, and he has been most ably assisted by the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg)—I am sorry that he is not here—who made all sorts of outrageous accusations in the House when the matter was raised.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman used to be the chief bellringer of the Conservative Party. It seems that he has now become the chief muckraker of the Conservative Party—particularly if elections are pending. Last week, the right hon. and learned Gentleman had the impertinence to suggest that my right hon. Friend was in process of setting up some sort of police State. Those were his exact words.
That suggestion is ludicrous, particularly as it was directed at my right

hon. Friend, because there is no other person against whom it would be possible to lay that charge with greater inaccuracy. I have known my right hon. Friend for about 15 years. Any suggestion that he would act in a manner which tended to deprive people of their legitimate rights without proper cause is too ludicrous for words.
The Opposition appears to be in some difficulty concerning that allegation, because, whereas the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone and others on the Opposition Front Bench have accused my right hon. Friend of setting up a police State, we had the accusation today from the right hon. Member for Streatham (Mr. Sandys) that this was an act of petty spite. It cannot be both. The impounding of this passport cannot be the first step towards a police State and at the same time be an act of petty spite.
It is the height of impudence for the party opposite to impute base motives to my right hon. Friend and those of us on this side for what has been done. As has been pointed out by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot) there were many occasions during the period in which the party opposite were in power when this arbitrary right was exercised. It was not only concerning passports that the party opposite used arbitrary powers. One need only go as far back as Nyasaland and the dawn arrests there which were subsequently condemned by the noble Lord, Lord Devlin, in his report. One can also recall the deportation of Archbishop Makarios, which, again, was an arbitrary act, and was illegal; the Enahoro case, and a whole string of others.
I make no complaint about right hon. Gentlemen opposite exercising those powers at that time, because they were responsible to Parliament, however much I might want to quarrel with the nature of their decision. I do not think that right hon. Gentlemen opposite are on firm ground in challenging my right hon. Friend's exercise of power in impounding Sir Frederick's passport, because identical procedures have been adopted for many years.
The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) gave the House a most interesting


and erudite lecture about the rule of law. I do not disagree with the principles which he enunciated, certainly in the first part of his speech, but what I found surprising was that he had kept his lecture tucked into his waiscoat pocket for so long. He was a member of the Government when those powers were being used, but his voice did not rise with all its Milton overtones in defence of liberty. I really do think that it is a bit thick for the Opposition to criticise my right hon. Friend for exercising the powers which they exercised during their period of office.
I wondered about the reasons for the indignation that we have seen generated on the benches opposite. I believe that there are two reasons for it. First, there is the social status of Sir Frederick. At Question Time last week the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas Home) laid great stress on the fact that Sir Frederick was a distinguished former colonial Governor. We heard a great deal about that aspect of his career. I wonder whether the Opposition would have raised such a hoo-ha if we had been discussing Fred the window cleaner, or Fred the dustbin man. I doubt it. Before they cry Civis Britannicus Sum they might like to consider that Palmerston was defnding a person not of Sir Frederick's social status.

Mr. Bernard Braine: I hope the hon. Gentleman is not overlooking the fact that Sir Frederick's passport is only one of a large number of such cases? One case which has aroused the greatest possible indignation is that of a former Mayor of Salisbury who is a known opponent of the Smith régime. On what basis has he been deprived of his passport?

Mr. Roebuck: That is not in the Motion. I agree that that case ought to be examined, and if the party opposite had shown more competence and put it on the Order Paper we might have been able to discuss it. If that is the hon. Gentleman's attitude, he finds an echoing call from my heart. If we go back to Rainborowe we can say that
The poorest he that is in England hath a life to live…",
but that has not been the Opposition's attitude.
The second reason why the party opposite has raised this issue is that although many hon. Gentlemen opposite voted for sanctions, many of them do not believe in them. They do not want to see sanctions used. They do not want to see the downfall of this illegal régime which intends to deprive human beings of the right to decide their future.
At election times hon. Gentlemen opposite drape their platforms with the Union flag, but when big business interests are threatened they decide not to support Her Majesty's Government in defending those who show loyalty to the Queen, and say that those who want to travel on a British passport should get every aid and comfort from the Crown, when they have not been supporting the Crown in Southern Rhodesia. I find it hard to understand the Opposition's attitude.
I shall be very brief, but the issue has been raised by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Ipswich, and by others, about whether it is proper for a Minister alone to have the power to impound a passport. Some hon. Members think that there ought to be some right of appeal to a tribunal. I am not out of sympathy with that idea, but let it not be said that there has not been some sort of appeal in this case. The matter has been thoroughly ventilated in the House, and my right hon. Friend has given the reasons why this passport has been impounded. That in itself gives the absolute lie to the suggestion by the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone that we are living in a police State. We have had every opportunity today to hear from hon. Gentlemen opposite why this person
who has shown disloyalty to the Crown should be given a passport and assistance by the Government in travelling about the world. The matter has been gone through very thoroughly indeed.
I accept entirely the reasons which my right hon. Friend has given for the impounding of this passport, but I think it desirable that the House should give further study to the system which has operated for so long. It is desirable that we should have a more efficient method of examining Ministerial actions with regard to the impounding of passports. One of the suggestions that is going the rounds is that aggrieved persons should be able to apply to a tribunal of Her Majesty's


judges. I do not think I find myself particularly attracted to that idea. Her Majesty's judges over the years—and I am not referring to the present ones—have never been in the vanguard of liberty. It is this House which has been the beacon of liberty to the nation, and I should like to see a system introduced whereby aggrieved persons can come to a Select Committee where the matter at issue can be considered; for it is this House which ought to examine whether liberty has been interfered with.
I think that my right hon. Friend has made his case. Whatever misgivings I had at Question Time last week have been removed by the full and frank explanation that we have received. I am astonished to discover that, in the face of that, hon. Gentlemen opposite can proceed with their Motion. I shall vote for the Government tonight with a very good heart.

6.17 p.m.

Mr. Frederic Harris: I am encouraged to speak because my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (Mr. Michael Hamilton) said that he did not know Sir Frederick Crawford personally. So far as I know, nobody has made personal references to him. I have been privileged to have known Sir Frederick, Lady Crawford and the family—and so have my family—for many years.
I have been a great admirer of Sir Frederick throughout his distinguished colonial service, particularly so because of my personal knowledge of him when he was Deputy Governor of Kenya, and subsequently when he became Governor of Uganda. He is a man of very moderate views indeed. He has done as much as anyone to help to bring together the people of all races in Africa, but particularly in East Africa. He is highly regarded personally by everyone in that part of the world.
Subsequent to his retirement from the Colonial Service Sir Frederick's business took him to Rhodesia, and there he has continued to play a prominent rôle. As must be appreciated by all those who know him personally, he has played no active part whatsoever in politics in Rhodesia. Irrespective of what the Minister said, and irrespective of what others have said today, Sir Frederick is not a U.D.I. supporter. Indeed, with his

distinguished and outstanding record, there is obviously tremendous loyalty from Sir Frederick to our Crown, and it is appalling to me that a man with such a history, and holding such sensible and reasonable views which have themselves markedly helped to pave the way for political stability in East Africa between all races, should have been put in this extremely embarrassing position.
When, last February, we debated the Asian exodus from Kenya, it was, regrettably, only too evident, right from the beginning, that responsible Ministers completely lacked knowledge of the facts and the circumstances. Now, this unforgivable blunder has occurred again, undoubtedly arising from the original responsibility of someone for whom the Minister and Ministers are now covering up. Of course, in such a position, the Government will try to stand their ground, but in the circumstances this is quite disgraceful because it is tantamount to finding a man guilty without any proof and without giving him any opportunity to refute the charges. I wondered when the Secretary of State was speaking, whether he would be prepared to make that statement again outside the House. I very much doubt it.
Having made this terrible mistake, the Government should admit it and should return Sir Frederick's passport to him. Noting else can be accepted. Even then, however, they will have caused untold hurt to a man whose conduct is absolutely beyond reproach and who should command the respect of all hon. Members.

6.22 p.m.

Mr. David Winnick: I do not question the sincerity of the Opposition in raising this matter. I believe that they are sincere and genuine. Anyone watching the way they acted last week on the occasion of the Private Notice Question of the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) could not doubt the genuineness of their concern over Sir Frederick Crawford's passport. I accept, therefore, that there is very little humbug or hypocrisy over this issue.
But I have not been impressed by their case either last week or today, and this is through no lack of concern on my part about civil liberties. I hope that I have as much concern in personal freedom and


civil liberty, in Britain and elsewhere, as right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite. But I am not impressed because one cannot consider this particular issue in isolation from the whole position in Rhodesia.
When the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) spoke about "the folly of sanctions"—he will find from tomorrow's HANSARD that those were his actual words—I felt that he summed up the feeling of so many right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite, that basically they are not on our side in trying to win the battle with what we believe to be an illegal and racialist régime in Salisbury. We are virtually in a state of war with that régime. I ask right hon. and hon. Gentlemen to remember that.
It would have been relatively easy for the British Government, since U.D.I., to have resolved the colonial problem in Rhodesia. Both Governments have been faced with tough colonial problems and generally sometimes unfortunately with some violence and bloodshed, at the end of the day we have resolved them. The reason that the Government have not been able to solve the Rhodesian problem and why we are virtually at war is that we refuse to sacrifice the interests of 4 million people who are denied their natural rights because of the colour of their skin.
I hope that the time will not come—certainly under my Government and, I hope, under a Conservative Government—when we will sell out the rights of the majority of the Rhodesian people—[Laughter.] I am concerned, even if some hon. Gentlemen opposite consider it amusing, with the majority of people In Rhodesia. The Africans, and certainly their leaders, believe that we should continue a sanctions policy.
However, apart from the general position in Rhodesia, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot) said, hundreds of people are held in detention and restriction. One can go through all the copies of HANSARD since U.D.I. without, I believe, finding a single occasion when any Conservative Member has raised the position of those Africans held in detention. They have shown a complete lack of concern. They are concerned purely because of the case of a colonial ex-Governor whose pass-

port has been withdrawn. I do not disagree with those who have paid tribute on both sides to the person in question. No doubt, over the years, he has given great and distinguished service to the country. I would not wish to deny that: why should I? But he knows very well that, since U.D.I., by giving comfort to the illegal régime, he was acting against the interests of his own country.
The right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg), in a very heated exchange last week, implied that Britain was becoming a police State. But it is not Britain which is becoming a police State: it is Rhodesia which remains a police State and uses all the forms of arbitrary arrest and detention to silence opposition to the illegal régime.
I believe that the Government have been right and justified in taking away Sir Frederick Crawford's passport and I hope that it will be a warning to others who have been giving comfort and who have—I must use this expression—virtually "fellow-travelled" with the régime since U.D.I., people who have known the score but have not cared a damn about Britain's interests or those of the majority of people in Rhodesia. It has been said that if Sir Frederick Crawford were in the House, he would be able to explain why he acted in this way. But he had an interview today with the Commonwealth Secretary and he was not willing then to give the requested assurances. Were those assurances so unreasonable? Of course not.
The trouble with the Opposition is that, time and again, whenever a Rhodesian issue comes up, they can, almost automatically, including their Leader, be relied upon to take the point of view of the illegal régime and not to see the point of view of their own country—[HON. MEMBERS: "Do not be silly."] Right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite say that I should not be silly, but when the history of this incident is written—[HON. MEMBERS: "The hon. Gentleman will not be here."] I agree that I may not be here, but I hope that the history books will nevertheless say that, when we showed such concern for 4 million Africans over a quarter of a million Europeans, the British Government in these years were right and justified. I may not be here, but I hope that the time comes when the majority in Rhodesia


can exercise their natural democratic rights, which are now denied them.
The Government have acted correctly and I only hope that the Opposition will recognise that they, too, have a responsibility. We know that a number of Conservative hon. Members have been going over to Salisbury and telling the illegal régime, "Hang on and do not worry: a Conservative Government will give you all you want"—[HON. MEMBERS: "Really."] I believe this to be the case; those hon. Gentlemen who have been saying this to the illegal régime know who they are and it is unlikely that they will deny it. [HON. MEMBERS: "Name them."] One hon. Gentleman went on Salisbury Radio nine or twelve months ago—this was raised in this House—and virtually took to task a Rhodesian newspaper which was critical of the Rhodesian régime. Where is his loyalty? [HON. MEMBERS: "Name him."] Hon. Members know who he was, and had I known that I would have to mention him, I would have given him notice that I would mention his name. But I am willing to do so later.
I hope that the Opposition will withdraw their Motion. If not, I will go into the Lobby against it with no hesitation, because I believe that the Government have made out a very good case for Sir Frederick Crawford's passport being taken away from him.

6.30 p.m.

Mr. Edward Heath: Some hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Winnick), have ranged fairly widely in their speeches over the different aspects of the Government's policy towards Rhodesia. I do not propose to follow their example, because there will be another occasion to do that. I wish to come to the real subject of the debate, which is, in its broadest aspect, the relationship between the Executive and the citizen. This is a debate on the rights of the individual and personal liberties.
This is a matter about which the right hon. Gentleman the Commonwealth Secretary and hon. Gentlemen opposite have, in the past, always shown much concern. They have constantly expressed their deep anxiety not only about this as a general principle, but about individual cases which they have raised in the House. It

is a matter for regret that in some cases today their deep feeling of bitterness about the Rhodesian situation has clouded their customary concern for the rights of the individual, whether it be a person of influence or a person of no importance whatever. I wish concentrate on the specific issue of the debate on which the vote will be taken later.
First, however, I want to clear the air of some misconceptions. Some hon. Gentlemen opposite has stated that there has been in the debate and that there is in the Motion no general statement of concern for the rights of the African. Many of them have, at the same time, paid tribute to the work which Sir Frederick has done as a most distinguished Governor to further those rights and, indeed, to bring colonial territories to full independence as African countries.
As the Commonwealth Secretary will agree, in the situation in Rhodesia today Her Majesty's Government are unable at the moment to do anything about the rights of Africans, whereas in the matter which has been brought before the House the Government have a specific responsibility. It is, therefore, right that we should raise it in the House. Indeed, I rather wonder whether, if my right hon. Friend the Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) had not been in touch with the right hon. Gentleman's Department and had not asked Questions, the matter would ever have come to light and been debated in the House.
I also wish to make it clear that, in considering the right of Her Majesty's Government to withhold or withdraw a passport, there is, of course, no question whatever of the Government's technical right to do this. There is absolutely no question on that score and, naturally, they can do it under the prerogative. However, it is not correct to say, as the Commonwealth Secretary said last Thursday, that this does not damage or inconvenience the subject. That may have been so at the time when passports for most of the world were either not necessary or did not exist, but today, in the modern world, a passport is essential to enable one to travel freely about one's business. Thus, to withhold it or withdraw it is undeniably gravely damaging to the work of the individual and in many cases to the individual's reputation.
This may raise in modern times the question whether this matter should be handled only through the prerogative. The Times raised this today in a leader and perhaps this is an important question which should be looked at afresh by any Government, perhaps through some suitable form of machinery which they might set up.
There are undoubtedly arguments both ways on this matter, particularly about the way in which the prerogative has been used in the past. However, there is no doubt that in the present situation Her Majesty's Government have the right to withdraw a passport and that the Secretary of State is right to say that passports were withheld and impounded by former Governments. It should be remembered that, when this was done in the past, it was done most sparingly. There were very few cases of it being done. From my experience of Government, I imagine that it was not done on more than two or three occasions a year, if that. It was almost always done in cases where there was a criminal charge, and it was thought that bail was likely to be broken and where it was wished to stop any sort of outlet through the normal channels, or—and these were particularly important cases—where there was a suspected security danger to the safety of the State, including the safety of a colonial territory.
This is a matter of the gravest national interest and it is for this reason that the prerogative has been maintained in the withholding or impounding of a passport. It was, of course, axiomatic that action followed either by way of a criminal case—or was in process in the criminal courts—or, because of suspicion of treachery, a charge was brought in a particular case. Every case was considered carefully before the action and the papers were examined by the Secretary of State, the Foreign Secretary, the Colonial Secretary, the Commonwealth Secretary or the Home Secretary and action was taken at that specific time in such cases.
A quite different situation exists over the withdrawal of British passports in respect of Rhodesia, and this is of fundamental importance to the debate and the future conduct of the Government. I will point out some of the differences in the present position relating to Rho-

desia and the previous situation. This withdrawal of a passport—and the other cases which have been handled by the Government—is not in respect of a case where action is being taken to prevent movement out of the country, because, as the Secretary of State said, Sir Frederick can go back to Rhodesia. Nor is action being taken in the case of a criminal charge for fear of breaking bail. Nor is action being taken to protect the safety of the Realm. These cases are, therefore, in quite a different category from any action taken in the past under the prerogative.
Passports are being removed, impounded,
by the present Government, by a Minister, on political grounds because Ministers disagree with the alleged political views and behaviour of individual citizens. That is the basis on which they are being withdrawn. Or, as we have heard today, a passport is being withheld because an individual apparently does not live up to those standards which Ministers, and the Commonwealth Secretary in particular, expect of him. The Secretary of State said that quite openly and frankly. This is the basis on which the House must consider that passports are being removed on a scale which at present is unknown; and I hope that the Minister will deal with this matter specifically.
What is more, Ministers themselves decide which citizen is expected to live up to which particular standard. This is not a criterion which has been announced publicly or even informed privately to the individual. It remains in the mind of a Minister until, in debate, he is forced, reluctantly—as the right hon. Gentleman said, not as a precedent—to announce it. This is an entirely different situation from anything that happened in the past. Moreover, it is on a scale which has never before been known. The only figure we have is that 450 passports have been withheld or withdrawn so far, some Rhodesian and some British.
We do not know the make-up of the total. May we be told? We do know, however, that if the United Nations resolution is carried, the scale of this operation will be greatly increased; there can be no doubt about that, either. [Interruption.] Hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway opposite may have different views, but they do not alter my fundamental point; that this is a complete


change from the use of the prerogative in the past.
The decisions by Ministers must be taken on information which, by the nature of the situation, is bound to be comparatively scanty. Sometimes it will be newspaper reports—and we know that they are not always entirely accurate—and sometimes it will be tittle-tattle. Perhaps it is provided by people whose views—and this we understand well, considering the very tense situation in which they are living—can be highly coloured.
This is not the basis on which previous decisions have been taken in respect of the use of the prerogative, and it is a vital point in the procedure which Ministers are now following. Moreover, they are not taking decisions themselves all the time. I deeply regret this. The right hon. Gentleman said on Thursday that he saw the papers that had been brought to him on Wednesday evening and came to the conclusion that the passport should be impounded.
Sir Frederick Crawford arrived in London on Tuesday, The passport had already been impounded. The decision was taken
nine months previously by his predecessor, now Lord Aylestone. Obviously, the Commonwealth Secretary had not had time, or had not known about these matters, to be able to examine the specific case himself and instruct action to be taken until after the passport had been impounded and it became public news. Incidentally, Sir Frederick Crawford came back to London in November of last year, six months after the decision to impound his passport was taken, but it was not done. Even on their own policy the Government are grossly incompetent.
Sir Frederick Crawford then came back and apparently attended a party to which the Secretary of State referred and to which he took exception. But this was after the decision by Lord Aylestone to impound the passport. It can, therefore, have had no reference to the decision of the officer at London Airport. It could have had very little to do with it.
This brings me to the point raised by my right hon. Friend—the black list. Will the Commonwealth Secretary tell the House exactly what is the position about the black list? Is this also circulated to foreign Governments? Has the

prerogative been delegated to a foreign Government to impound a British passport? If so, by what right have Her Majesty's Government done that?
For the reasons which I have given, I do not believe that, if the Government wish to continue with their policy, they can possibly do so by the use of prerogative, in which they refuse to tell the House, or the individual, the grounds on which they have taken action. If the Government intend to continue with the present arrangement for impounding passports, then they must do three things.
First, they must state absolutely clearly the rules on which they are operating. To have a general phrase about "being actively in support of a régime" is not good enough. Secondly, they must inform people if they have lost their right to use a British passport. This is a responsibility of Her Majesty's Government and, if they do this, they must arrange a system so that the case can be heard, and so that a citizen deprived of his passport on these political grounds can attempt to justify himself. This system must be set up. It could be either a judicial system, or, if it is thought to involve security, it could involve Privy Councellors, but preferably a judicial system.
I say to the Government that their approach is completely indefensible, and they must abandon this approach entirely and themselves return to the rule of law. It is no use hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway preaching and telling others that they should observe the rule of law if they sneer when their own Government are asked to do so.

Mr. George Brown: I was only trying to suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that he ought to consult his own practice in this matter. He behaved in this way and he did not regard it as a breach of the rule of law when he did so.

Mr. Heath: I have explained to the House, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman was listening, that the difference between what happened when he was Foreign Secretary, in the very small number of cases on security and criminal grounds, is quite different from what will happen in the large number of cases which is bound to ensue if the Government continued with their policy of dealing with individuals on political grounds. This is a fundamental difference. If


British citizens break the law they should be brought to trial for it, and this is what this Government have failed to do and are, in fact, unable to do. Therefore, they have resorted to the use of purely political devices.
I come to the case of Sir Frederick Crawford. I was very glad that the Secretary of State today cleared out of the way the misrepresentations arising from his statements last Thursday. In another place, Lord Shepherd did this last Thursday. He said that it had nothing whatever to do with industrial matters of any kind. That cleared that out of the way completely. These are purely personal grounds.
There have been some who have said that this case has been raised because Sir Frederick Crawford is influential. In fact, hon. Members of this House never heard about the other cases related by my right hon. Friend until this case became public, because they were not brought to public notice. I hope that the Secretary of State will deal with each of the cases which has been brought up here today. Sir Frederick, even though he may or may not be influential, is entitled to exactly the same rights as any individual citizen. Why should he be treated any differently from any other citizen who has come from Rhodesia?
The evidence given by the Commonwealth Secretary this afternoon was, to say the least, exceedingly thin. Apparnetly, Sir Frederick Crawford does not call the Governor "His Excellency". There are many hon. Gentlemen on both Front Benches who have neglected to do that. It was said by the right hon. and learned Member for Ipswich (Sir Dingle Foot) that he referred to "my Prime Minister". If the right hon. and learned Member will refer to the statement of the Chief Justice of Rhodesia he will see that in his judgments he refers to "our Prime Minister".
Matters which may be offensive to
the Government include, apparently, organising charitable functions at which members of the Administration appear. The Secretary of State said, "in order to sponsor the Administration", but what matter of judgment is this, as to whether a continuing charitable function at which representatives of the Administration

appear is, in fact, sponsoring them, or even organised to sponsor them? These are matters which cannot justify the action which the Secretary of State has taken.
I wish to ask the Secretary of State this question. The Prime Minister has told the Armed Forces and the Civil Service to continue to work with the régime. Is a businesman not to do this? There are some people in Rhodesia who want to work with both sides; they have what they consider to be no alternative. Some want to remain neutral. The plain fact is that the Commonwealth Secretary does not want Sir Frederick Crawford to remain neutral. He wants to force him to come out and declare, in the form of the declaration he has produced, those words. That is the situation the Commonwealth Secretary wants. To him I say that he has no right to demand that of any individual in Rhodesia, and he has no right to take away a passport if the individual does not do it.
In conclusion, I have absolutely no doubt—and I do not believe that any right hon. or hon. Gentleman in this House any doubt—about the loyalty of Sir Frederick Crawford to the Crown. [HON. MEMBERS: "We have."] Not for one moment. Those who have worked with him and know him do not doubt that. I do not believe that the Secretary of State is, therefore, justified in the action that he has taken.
We condemn him for a procedure which has been described as guilt by association, which may affect people throughout Rhodesia and many in this country. We condemn him because we do not believe that this action contributes in any way to a settlement in Rhodesia, and we condemn him on the specific action of impounding the passport of Sir Frederick Crawford, and for these reasons we shall vote against the Government tonight.

6.48 p.m.

Mr. George Thomson: The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bexley (Mr. Heath) began with a strongly reasoned case—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The right hon. Member requires the leave of the House.

Mr. Thomson: With your permission, Sir, and with the leave of the House, I would like to reply to some points which have been made in the debate.
The right hon. Gentleman began with a strongly reasoned case on an aspect of this problem which causes legitimate concern in many quarters of the House, and that is the problem of how, in the special circumstances of the Rhodesian situation, one can safeguard adequately the rights of individuals. If he had continued on that plane I would have said that this was a very suitable subject for a serious debate in the House, but did not seem to be an adequate subject for a censure Motion. He did, however, come back to more polemical material at the end, and I will deal with that before I finish.
First, I would like to deal with the anxiety he expressed, and which a number of my hon. Friends and the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) expressed, about the need for an independent review procedure in cases where passports are impounded. This is a real problem, but, of course, it is not a new problem. It is a problem that faced the Conservative Government just as much as it faces the present Government. As I shall show in a moment, the scale of the problem is not very different from what it was with previous Governments in this country. For many years now the great reluctance of Governments to use the power of the prerogative has itself been accepted as a sufficient safeguard to its abuse. All Governments are aware of the very strong feelings that these cases arouse, and no Government will lightly flout them.
Leaving aside the special category of the Rhodesian cases, which I will come to in a moment, there have been about a score of cases of the denial of passports on anything which could broadly be called political grounds in the 23 years under successive Governments since the war. Fourteen of them are cases of mercenaries. The figure of 2,400 quoted by the hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. David Steel) are, as to 99 per cent. of them, people who get hard up on holiday and hand in their passports to get their fares home paid.
On this issue of an appeal procedure in relation to passports generally, I am

sure that The Times is right today when it says that this debate is merely the opening of discussions that will go on about this important area concerning the liberty of the individual.
I have been looking urgently into the possibility of special review arrangements to meet the exceptional circumstances regarding the Rhodesian rebellion, and I assure hon. Members that we will consider very carefully what has been said on this aspect of the matter. However, first of all, I want to explain the scale of this. It is on a bigger scale than the non-Rhodesian passport problem, but it is not the difference of scale which has been suggested.
The right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) spoke about hundreds of passports. What is true is that there are about 600 cases of Rhodesians coming here with Rhodesian passports emanating from the illegal régime who have had those passports taken from them, but have had them replaced, as so many want them replaced, by British passports. In fact, there has been no single case in the 600 where anyone has been refused passport facilities.
One comes down to a group of about 24 cases in over two and a half years and, when one looks at the volume of travel between Rhodesia and here and the circumstances created by U.D.I., it is fair to say that the vast majority of ordinary Rhodesian holders of British passports are able to go about their affairs without interference. I hope that that will put the matter in proper perspective. I have said—

Mr. R. Gresham Cooke: rose—

Mr. Thomson: I am sorry. I cannot give way. The right hon. Member for Bexley took a little longer than was anticipated, and I want to finish what I have to say if I can.
I have said that we will look sympathetically at the possibility of review arrangements, but the House has to face the fact that there are real difficulties both about having an adequate review tribunal and, at the same time, having an effective passport policy against those who, in one way or another, give active support to the régime.
I ask hon. Members, particularly my hon. Friends, to recognise that there is a real conflict between our two aims. While we are ready to consider carefully any practicable method of reviewing cases, we are bound to give priority to ending the rebellion. This is where there is a disagreement between the two sides and where right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite misunderstand the policy of Her Majesty's Government.
The reason for this lies in the nature of what we are seeking to do in Rhodesia. We are seeking a solution without the use of force. This is not a vendetta over passports. We are employing economic, political and psychological weapons as a means of avoiding the tragedy of military warfare, and the use of passports in this respect is a legitimate weapon. We consider that it is legitimate to say to those whose activities are likely to assist and encourage the rebels that they will not be given the assistance of British passports; in travelling to third countries.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: rose—

Mr. Thomson: No, I will not give way.
The realities of the Rhodesian situation, particularly in the case of sanctions breakers—though this does not apply to the case that we are discussing in the Opposition's Motion—are that much of our information comes from sources which it is impossible to reveal without destroying their usefulness.
These powers will be used in the future, as they have in the past, only in a small minority of cases. If in future cases of passport withdrawal, similar to that of Sir Frederick Crawford, the individual concerned gives some public and unequivocal demonstration of attachment to the legitimate Government, I will be ready—except in the case of sanctions-breakers—to consider restoring his passport facilities.
I have been asked about the effect of the current United Nations discussions on this aspect of the Rhodesian problem. It is wrong to say that they will increase the problem in scale, but they will greatly change the nature of it. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary made it very clear that people from Rhodesia who were also United Kingdom citizens would still be able to come here unless they are sanctions breakers or supporters of the regime, and I have given sufficient indication of how small the proportion is.
What will change is that, under the present drafts before the United Nations, it is likely that people coming into that category, as well as people holding passports of the illegal régime, will be turned back when they try to enter this country. However, there will be full opportunity for the House to debate that when it comes before us.
I want now to turn to the Opposition Motion of censure and to the extravagant charges—

Hon. Members: Harper.

Mr. Thomson: I am in some difficulty about time. In the case of Mr. Harper, there has been no mistake about the name. He was Mayor of Salisbury during the first two years of U.D.I., and he was publicly associated with the arrival of sanctions-breaking petroleum after the petrol sanction was put on. But Mr. Harper has indicated that he may wish to emigrate to Malta, and we have told him that, if he does, we shall reconsider the matter and give him back his passport.
The question was raised of passports being confiscated at Frankfurt. They were impounded not by the German authorities, but by Her Majesty's Consulate-General in Frankfurt. One of the gentlemen was the chairman of Rhodesia Iron and Steel Company, and the other was the managing director of Rhodesia Alloys. We had evidence that they were attempting to promote trade in Rhodesian goods in breach of the sanction laws of this country, and I hope that the Opposition will support us in legislation that passed through this House.
I turn, then, to the Opposition Motion of censure. There have been the most extravagant charges of tyranny and vindictiveness. This House is always anxious to protect the freedom of any individual. The Opposition have got themselves to the stage where they have lost all sense of fairness and perspective. I am far from suggesting that it is a light matter to deprive a United Kingdom citizen of his passport, but it is exaggerating to use such language as
an extreme use of arbitrary powers.
The language which came from right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite in the debate might have been more appropriate if it had been used about the hundreds of British subjects who are forcibly detained,


or whose movements are forcibly restricted in the country where Sir Frederick Crawford now lives. There is no redress for those men. They are not allowed to travel inside, far less outside the country. But we have heard no indignation from right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite on that subject.
I want to emphasise that Sir Frederick Crawford is free to go back to Rhodesia. He is also free to go on television, or on "The World at One", to his heart's content. That is some police State! And some censorship! I recollect that, when I was in Rhodesia, the B.B.C.'s representatives were refused entry permits to permit them to cover my visit.
I conclude on this note. It is all
important for us to end the Rhodesian rebellion in justice and peace, however long it takes. This is not a matter of one man or another being called "Excellency". It is not even a matter of putting down a rebellion against the Crown. It goes deeper than that—

Mr. William Whitelaw: rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.

Mr. Faulds: Shoddy little man!

Mr. Tony Gardner: Hon. Members opposite say that they believe in free speech!

Question, That the Question be now put, put and agreed to.

Question put accordingly,
That this House condemns Her Majesty's Government for withdrawing Sir Frederick Crawford's passport:—

The House proceeded to a Division—

Mr. Roebuck: (seated and covered): On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I respectfully draw your attention to the fact that the Division was called before the hour of seven had been reached?

Mr. Speaker: I am aware of all the facts of the situation.

The House divided: Ayes 235, Noes 322.

Division No. 139.]
AYES
[7.0 p.m.


Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)
Corfield, F. V.
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.


Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)
Costain, A. P.
Hamilton, Lord (Fermanagh)


Astor, John
Craddock, Sir Beresford (Spelthorne)
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)


Atkins, Humphrey (M't'n &amp; M'd'n)
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Sir Oliver
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.W.)


Awdry, Daniel
Crouch, David
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)


Baker, Kenneth (Acton)
Crowder, F. P.
Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere


Balniel, Lord
Cunningham, Sir Knox
Hastings, Stephen


Barber, Rt. Hn. Anthony
Currie, G. B. H.
Hawkins, Paul


Batsford, Brian
Dance, James
Hay, John


Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton
d' Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Heald, Rt. Hn. Sir Lionel


Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torquay)
Dean, Paul (Somerset, N.)
Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward


Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gos. &amp; Fhm)
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F. (Ashford)
Heseltine, Michael


Berry, Hn. Anthony
Digby, Simon Wingfield
Higgins, Terence L.


Biffen, John
Dodds-Parker, Douglas
Hiley, Joseph


Biggs-Davison, John
Donnelly, Desmond
Hill, J. E. B.


Birch, Rt. Hn. Nigel
Douglas-Home, Rt. Hn. Sir Alec
Hirst, Geoffrey


Black, Sir Cyril
Drayson, G. B.
Hogg, Rt. Hn. Quintin


Blaker, Peter
du Cann, Rt. Hn. Edward
Holland, Philip


Boardman, Tom
Eden, Sir John
Hordern, Peter


Body, Richard
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Hornby, Richard


Bossom, Sir Clive
Elliott, R.W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Howell, David (Guildford)


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hn. John
Emery, Peter
Hunt, John


Boyle, Rt. Hn. Sir Edward
Farr, John
Hutchison, Michael Clark


Braine, Bernard
Fisher, Nigel
Iremonger, T. L.


Brewis, John
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)


Brinton, Sir Tatton
Fortescue, Tim
Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. Sir Walter
Foster, Sir John
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Fraser, Rt. Hn. Hugh (St'fford &amp; Stone)
Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)


Bruce-Gardyne, J.
Galbraith, Hon. T. G.
Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)


Bryan, Paul
Gibson-Watt, David
Jopling, Michael


Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N &amp; M)
Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)
Kaberry, Sir Donald


Buck, Antony (Colchester)
Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
Kerby, Capt. Henry


Bullus, Sir Eric
Glyn, Sir Richard
Kershaw, Anthony


Burden, F. A.
Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.
Kimball, Marcus


Campbell, Gordon
Goodhart, Philip
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)


Carlisle, Mark
Goodhew, Victor
Kitson, Timothy


Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert
Gower, Raymond
Knight, Mrs. Jill


Cary, Sir Robert
Grant, Anthony
Lambton, Viscount


Channon, H. P. G.
Grant-Ferris, R.
Lane, David


Clark, Henry
Gresham Cooke, R.
Langford-Holt Sir John


Clegg, Walter
Grieve, Percy
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry


Cooke, Robert
Gurden, Harold
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)


Cooper-Key, Sir Neill
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Lloyd, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)




Lloyd, Rt. Hn. Selwyn (Wirral)
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M. (Ripon)


Longden, Gilbert
Page, John (Harrow, W.)
Tapsell, Peter


McAdden, Sir Stephen
Pearson, Sir Frank (Clitheroe)
Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)


MacArthur, Ian
Percival, Ian
Taylor, Edward M. (G'gow,Cathcart)


Maclean, Sir Fitzroy
Peyton, John
Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)


Macleod, Ft. Hn. Iain
Pike, Miss Mervyn
Teeling, Sir William


McMaster, Stanley
Pink, R. Bonner
Temple, John M.


Macmillan, Maurice (Farnham)
Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret


Madden, Martin
Price, David (Eastleigh)
Tilney, John


Maginnis, John E.
Prior, J. M. L.
Turton, Rt. Hn. R. H.


Marples, Rt. Hn. Ernest
Pym, Francis
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Marten, Neil
Quennell, Miss J. M.
Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hn. Sir John


Maude, Angus
Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James
Vickers, Dame Joan


Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald
Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter
Walker, Peter (Worcester)


Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Rees-Davies, W. R.
Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek


Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.
Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David
Wall, Patrick


Mills, Peter (Torrington)
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Walters, Dennis


Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)
Ridley, Hn. Nicholas
Ward, Dame Irene


Miscampbell, Norman
Ridsdale, Julian
Weatherill, Bernard


Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Rippon, Rt, Hn. Geoffrey
Webster, David


Monro, Hector
Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Montgomery, Fergus
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)
Whitelaw, Rt. Hn. William


Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)
Royle, Anthony
Williams, Donald (Dudley)


Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles
Russell, Sir Ronald
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Munro-Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
St. John-Stevas, Norman
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Murton, Oscar
Sandys, Rt. Hn. D.
Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick


Nabarro, Sir Gerald
Scott, Nicholas
Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard


Neave, Airey
Scott-Hopkins, James
Woodnutt, Mark



Sharples, Richard
Worsley, Marcus


Nicholls, Sir Harmer
Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh &amp; Whitby)
Wright, Esmond


Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael
Silvester, Frederick
Wylie, N. R.


Nott, John
Sinclair, Sir George
Younger, Hn. George


Onslow, Cranley
Smith, Dudley (W'wick &amp; L'mington)



Orr, Capt. L. P. S.
Smith, John (London &amp; W'minster)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Orr-Ewing, Sir Ian
Speed, Keith
Mr. Jasper More and


Osborn, John (Hallam)
Stainton, Keith
Mr. Reginald Eyre.


Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)
Stodart, Anthony





NOES


Abse, Leo
Coleman, Donald
Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)


Albu, Austen
Concannon, J. D.
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Conlan, Bernard
Foley, Maurice


Alldritt, Walter
Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)


Allen, Scholefield
Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Ford, Ben


Anderson, Donald
Crawshaw, Richard
Forrester, John


Archer, Peter
Cronin, John
Fowler, Gerry


Armstrong, Ernest
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony
Fraser, John (Norwood)


Atkins, Ronald (Preston, N.)
Crossman, Rt. Hn. Richard
Freeson, Reginald


Atkinson, Norman (Tottenham)
Cullen, Mrs. Alice
Galpern, Sir Myer


Bacon, Rt. Hn. Alice
Dalyell, Tam
Gardner, Tony


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Davidson, Arthur (Accrington)
Garrett, W. E.


Barnes, Michael
Davidson, James (Aberdeenshire, W.)
Ginsburg, David


Barnett, Joel
Davies, Ednyfed Hudson (Conway)
Gourlay, Harry


Baxter, William
Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Gray, Dr. Hugh (Yarmouth)


Beaney, Alan
Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford)
Gregory, Arnold


Bence, Cyril
Davies, Harold (Leek)
Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)


Bennett, James (G'gow, Bridgeton)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)
Griffiths, Rt. Hn. James (Llanelly)


Bidwell, Sydney
Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Gunter, Rt. Hn. R. J.


Binns, John
dc Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)


Bishop, E. S.
Delargy, Hugh
Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)


Blackburn, F.
Dell, Edmund
Hamting, William


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Dempsey, James
Hannan, William


Boardman, H. (Leigh)
Dewar, Donald
Harper, Joseph


Booth, Albert
Diamond, Rt. Hn. John
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)


Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur
Dickens, James
Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith


Boyden, James
Dobson, Ray
Haseldine, Norman


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Doig, Peter
Hattersley, Roy


Bradley, Tom
Driberg, Tom
Hazell, Bert


Bray, Dr. Jeremy
Dunn, James A.
Heffer, Eric S.


Brooks, Edwin
Dunnett, Jack
Henig, Stanley


Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)
Herbison, Rt. Hn. Margaret


Brown, Rt. Hn. George (Belper)
Dunwoody, Dr. John (F'th &amp; C'b'e)
Hilton, W. S.


Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)
Eadie, Alex
Hobden, Dennis (Brighton, K'town)


Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, W.)
Edelman, Maurice
Hooley, Frank


Brown, R. W. (Shoreditch &amp; F'bury)
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Horner, John


Buchan, Norman
Edwards, William (Merieneth)
Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas


Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)
Ellis, John
Howarth, Harry (Wellingborough)


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
English, Michael
Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.)


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Ennals, David
Howie, W.


Cant, R. B.
Ensor, David
Hoy, James


Carmichael, Neil
Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)
Huckfield, Leslie


Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara
Faulds, Andrew
Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)


Chapman, Donald
Fernyhough, E.
Hughes, Emrys (Ayrshire, S.)


Coe, Denis
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)







Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Marsh, Rt. Hn. Richard
Rodgers, William (Stockton)


Hunter, Adam
Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Roebuck, Roy


Hynd, John
Maxwell, Robert
Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)


Irvine, Sir Arthur
Mayhew, Christopher
Rose, Paul


Jackson, Colin (B'h'se &amp; Spenb'gh)
Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert
Ross, Rt. Hn. William


Jackson, Peter M. (High Peak)
Mendelson, J. J.
Rowlands, E. (Cardiff, N.)


Janner, Sir Barnett
Mikardo, Ian
Ryan, John


Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Millan, Bruce
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford, S.)


Jeger, George (Goole)
Miller, Dr. M. S.
Sheldon, Robert


Jeger, Mrs. Lena (H'b'n&amp;St.P'cras,S.)
Milne, Edward (Blyth)
Shinwell, Rt. Hn. E.


Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Mitchell, R. C. (S'th'pton, Test)
Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)


Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechford)
Moonman, Eric
Short, Rt. Hn. Edward (N'c'tle-u-Tyne)


Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Short, Mrs. Renee (W'hampton, N.E.)


Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull W.)
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)


Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)


Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W. Ham, S.)
Morris, John (Aberavon)
Silverman, Julius (Aston)


Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Moyle, Roland
Skeffington, Arthur


Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, West)
Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Slater, Joseph


Judd, Frank
Murray, Albert
Small, William


Kelley, Richard
Neal, Harold
Snow, Julian


Kenyon, Clifford
Newens, Stan
Spriggs, Leslie


Kerr, Mrs. Anne (R'ter &amp; Chatham)
Noel-Baker, Francis (Swindon)
Steel, David (Roxburgh)


Kerr, Dr. David (W'worth, Central)
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)
Steele, Thomas (Dunbartonshire, W.)


Kerr, Russell (Feltham)
Norwood, Christopher
Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R.


Lawson, George
Oakes, Gordon
Swain, Thomas


Leadbitter, Ted
Ogden, Eric
Symonds, J. B.


Ledger, Ron
O'Malley, Brian
Taverne, Dick


Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton)
Oram, Albert E.
Thomas, George (Cardiff, W.)


Lee, Rt. Hn. Jennie (Cannock)
Orbach, Maurice
Thomson, Rt. Hn. George


Lee, John (Reading)
Orme, Stanley
Thornton, Ernest


Lever, Harold (Cheetham)
Oswald, Thomas
Thorpe, Rt. Hn. Jeremy


Lever, L. M. (Ardwick)
Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, S'tn)
Tinn, James


Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)
Owen, Will (Morpeth)
Urwin, T. W.


Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Page, Derek (King's Lynn)
Varley, Eric G.


Lipton, Marcus
Palmer, Arthur
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley)


Lomas, Kenneth
Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Wainwright, Richard (Colne Valley)


Loughlin, Charles
Pardoe, John
Walden, Brian (All Saints)


Luard, Evan
Park, Trevor
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)


Lubbock, Eric
Parker, John (Dagenham)
Watkins, David (Consett)


Lyon, Alexander W. (York)
Parkin, Ben (Paddington, N.)
Weitzman, David


Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)
Parkyn, Brian (Bedford)
Wellbeloved, James


Mahon, Dr. J. Dickson
Pavitt, Laurence
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


McBride, Neil
Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Whitaker, Ben


McCann, John
Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
White, Mrs. Eirene


MacColl, James
Pentland, Norman
Whitlock, William


MacDermot, Niall
Perry, Ernest G. (Battersea, S.)
Wilkins, W. A.


Macdonald, A. H.
Perry, George H. (Nottingham, S.)
Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick


McGuire, Michael
Prentice, Rt. Hn. R. E.
Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)


McKay, Mrs. Margaret
Price, Christopher (Perry Barr)
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)


Mackie, John
Price, Thomas (Westhoughton)
Williams, Clifford (Abertillery)


Mackintosh, John P.
Price, William (Rugby)
Williams, Mrs. Shirley (Hitchin)


Maclennan, Robert
Probert, Arthur
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


MacMillan, Malcolm (Western Isles)
Pursey, Cmdr. Harry
Willis, Rt. Hn. George


McMillan Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Randall, Harry
Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)


McNamara, J. Kevin
Rankin, John
Winnick, David


MacPherson, Malcolm
Rees, Merlyn
Winstanley, Dr. M. P.


Mahon, Peter (Preston, S.)
Reynolds, G. W.
Woodburn, Rt. Hn. A.


Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Rhodes, Geoffrey
Woof, Robert


Mallalieu, J.P.W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Richard, Ivor
Wyatt, Woodrow


Manuel, Archie
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Yates, Victor


Mapp, Charles
Roberts, Gwilym (Bedfordshire, S.)



Marks, Kenneth
Robertson, John (Paisley)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Marquand, David
Robinson, Rt. Hn. Kenneth (St.P'c'as)
Mr. Ioan L. Evans and



Robinson, W. O. J. (Walth'stow, E.)
Mr. Charles Grey.

AGRICULTURE (SELECT COMMITTEE'S REPORT)

7.13 p.m.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Cledwyn Hughes): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of the Report from the Select Committee on Agriculture in the last Session of Parliament, and of the Departmental Observations thereon (Command Paper No. 3479).
This is an historic occasion, because it is the first time that this House has debated a Report from one of the Select Committees appointed, on an experimental basis, to look into the work of particular Departments. It is perhaps a mixed blessing to be first in a race of this kind, but I am glad that time has been found for this debate.
The papers before us are of an
importance which justifies their consideration by the House. I am sure my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal, would have been equally glad had the lot fallen to him. By agreeing to make time available so promptly after taking up his new responsibilities he has shown how anxious he is that this Report should be debated.
I should like to begin by paying tribute to the members of the Select Committee, and particularly to their Chairman, my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Tudor Watkins), for the immense care and trouble they took over this, their first report. I am sure that the whole House would wish to join me in thanking them. My hon. Friend the member for Brecon and Radnor has written to me explaining why he is unable to be here tonight. I shall have to refer later to some points on which I do not entirely agree with the Committee's conclusions, but I would like to make clear now that these differences in no way imply any inclination on my part to undervalue their efforts.
Perhaps I could now define just what I propose to cover in my speech. I intend to be brief because our debate has already been somewhat curtailed. I propose to deal with those aspects of the papers which relate directly to my Department. These aspects are two: first, the manner in which my Department co-operated with the Committee; second, the scope and adequacy of my Department's assess-

ment of the effects on this country's agriculture, fisheries and food of joining the European Economic Community.
Before I do so, however, I should like to say something about my own locus in this. I was not in charge of the Ministry of Agriculture when the Committee carried out its inquiry. That has its disadvantages and perhaps it has some advantages as well. The disadvantages are that I missed the pleasure of watching the Committee at work and of giving evidence, and I cannot, of course, know every last detail of what the Ministry of Agriculture did at that time. But I have read with very great care the two papers before us and the evidence which was given before the Committee, and I feel sufficiently familiar with all that was done to speak with just a little confidence about it now.
The advantage is that as a relative newcomer I can view all this with a measure of detachment which even my right hon. Friend, with all his well-known objectivity on these matters, might have found it difficult to equal.
First, then, the manner in which the Ministry of Agriculture co-operated with the Select Committee. I am very glad indeed to see from its Report that the Committee has virtually no criticism of this. It records its gratitude for the Department's wholehearted co-operation and for the time and trouble that official witnesses took to ensure that the Committee received the information it needed. I should like to pay my own tribute to those officials.
It would be wrong for me to pass over this without pointing out what I am sure the House recognises: that the establishment of Committees of this kind inevitably means a great deal more work for Departments. The preparation of written evidence and the giving of oral evidence make up a substantial additional burden. I observe from page viii of the Report that the Ministry of Agriculture submitted more than 30 memoranda on different subjects for this inquiry alone. This really represented a substantial additional task for officials in the Department. But, of course, this was recognised when the Committees were instituted. Nevertheless, I do not think that we should overlook it.
I turn now to the substance of the Committee's Report—Part II, which deals with the scope and adequacy of the


Ministry's assessment. This is the real crux of the matter. Was my Ministry's assessment of this vital question thoroughly carried out? Was it accurate? I am very glad to see that the Committee answers both questions in the affirmative. It recognises that the assessment was both detailed and continuous, and that sufficient priority had been given to the task to enable a comprehensive assessment to be made.
It goes on to say that on the three most important points—the effects on British farming, on consumers and on the balance of payments—the assessment had not been disputed and had clearly been based on solid foundations. I am quite convinced from my own observation that the assessment was very thoroughly carried out. The many papers, to which I have referred already, which my Department submitted to the Committee and the extent of its oral evidence—11 sittings of the Committee covering 190 pages of the printed record—are only the visible tip of the iceberg. A very great deal of work had been done so that the Government could take its decisions in full knowledge of the facts.
I have emphasised this because I now have to refer to the reservations the Committee expresses about some aspects of the Department's inquiries. I am sure that members of the Committee themselves would concede that these are subordinate matters which do not affect their main conclusion that the work was thoroughly carried out and the assessment accurate. The Committee's reservations really amount to just two general points. First, it was not convinced that the Department knew enough about the flexibility with which Community regulations might be operated in practice. Second, it felt that the Department might not have sufficiently consulted the interested bodies in this country.
The first of these reservations turns largely on a single point, the fact that the official witnesses did not lay emphasis on the extent to which the Community's agricultural regulations might not be applied to the letter, the extent, that is, to which we might be able to negotiate adjustments in those regulations to suit our own particular circumstances or to which adjustments might come about as a result of the pragmatic application of Community policy.
The Committee ascribes this reticence to ignorance. On this, I believe that it was mistaken. There are hon. Members now present who were members of the Committee, and I feel that, if they look back, they will agree that they did not find witnesses from my Department floundering when asked questions about the practical application of the common agricultural policy. [Laughter.] Looking at the Report, hon. Members must realise that they did not ask many such questions.
There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for this, which is set out in my Department's Observations. At the time when the Ministry witnesses gave evidence, no statement had been made about the Government's negotiating objectives as regards agriculture. If officials had at that time ventured opinions about the extent of the flexibility we could expect, they would have been prejudging not only the statement of our objectives but also the outcome of the negotiations. Clearly—I am sure the House will agree—it would have been quite wrong for them to do so.
To have further implied that, whatever the terms of Community regulations, there would be room for manoeuvre within them could only have given rise to quite unfounded suspicion of our good faith. I think that it was absolutely right for the Government witnesses to rest on the letter of Community law and to explain the effects of applying it without adjustment or derogation.
The Committee gives three examples of cases in which it thought the Department's assessment defective because of its insufficient emphasis on the flexibility of Community arrangements. Two of them were the effect on milk supplies and the effect on areas of particular difficulty. I recall that, although I was not Minister at that time, I was particularly interested, when the matter was being discussed, in the effect on hill farming in Wales. These two examples illustrate clearly the truth of what I have just been saying. Both are matters which the then Foreign Secretary dealt with when he set out our negotiating objectives in his speech of last July to the Western European Union.
My right hon. Friend said then that we would want to take up the question


of help for the hill areas with the Community and that we would want to find a solution to the problem of assuring milk supplies. It would have been quite wrong for officials to anticipate what the then Foreign Secretary said. The Committee's third example concerns the rôle of the management committees. But, however valuable the work of the management committees may be in the detailed implementation of Community regulations, the fact is that they have no power to alter essentials, and it was with essentials that the assessment was concerned.
The Committee's second reservation is about the adequacy of consultation with the various interests concerned—producers, workers, consumers and co-operatives. Here, I think that the best comment is to allow those interests to speak for themselves, as they have done. The National Farmers' Union has said that, so far as it is concerned, the criticism is unfounded. The National Union of Agricultural Workers told the Committee that it had had an open invitation, both from my predecessor and from the Department, to go to them on any matter in connection with the assessment. The Consumer Council expressed its satisfaction with the way in which the Ministry had conducted its enquiries.
The Committee singled out for particular attention the fact that co-operative organisations had not been consulted on the effect that joining the European Economic Community would have on the newly established Central Council for Agricultural and Horticultural Co-operation. This criticism seems to be based on a misunderstanding. There is no reason whatever to suppose that entry into the E.E.C. would prevent the Council from continuing to carry out its functions, which would, moreover, be just as necessary in Common Market conditions as they are now. There was, therefore, no need, in the context of preparation for negotiations, to consult the co-operative organisations about the Council's position.
In dealing tonight with the broad issues raised by the Select Committee's Report, I have tried to avoid too much detail, largely because the detailed points are fully covered in the second of the papers before us tonight, the Departmental Observations on the Committee's Report. I have also deliberately, and, in my view, properly, sought to concentrate on the

matters directly related to the work of my Department which the Committee was appointed to investigate at the time.
There are two things I should like to say in conclusion. First, I am convinced that my Department carried out this important work objectively and well, and I am glad to see that in all essentials the Committee's thorough investigation confirms that. Finally, I assure the House of my satisfaction that we do and shall continue to keep ourselves continuously informed and up to date on this and all other aspects of Departmental work in the light of changing circumstances and new developments.
The work of the Committee was very valuable. It has enabled us to debate these important subjects in the House this evening. The experiment, as I called it at the start, has been proved to be a success, and I pay tribute again to the chairman and hon. Members on both sides who contributed to that success.

Mr. Speaker: I observe to the House that 16 hon. and right hon. Members wish to speak in this half-day debate, including four Front Bench Members and 10 members of the Committee. I hope that speeches will be reasonably brief.

7.29 p.m.

Mr. J. B. Godber: I shall make my remarks as short as I can, but I have a rather wider brief to cover than the Minister had.
I begin by congratulating the right hon. Gentleman, for I think that this is the first opportunity I have had since he took office, on assuming his duties at the Ministry, and I wish him well. We shall seek to guide him along the right paths.
The right hon. Gentleman said that this was a historic occasion in that it is the first time we have debated a Report of one of the new Select Committees. He also said that the fact that we are debating it now shows how anxious the new Leader of the House must be to have it debated at an early date. It may be perfectly legitimate to say that, but does not it also show how reluctant his predecessor was to have it debated? He had many months in which he could have brought it forward for debate but failed to do so.
I am bound to spend a little more time on the question of procedure than did the Minister, because this is not only


a historic occasion but an important occasion from the point of view of getting the right attitude to the new Select Committees if they are to carry out their functions properly. There are certain aspects relating to the Ministry, the Leader of the House and the Foreign Office on which it would be proper to comment. I am very glad that the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs is here. I shall have one or two points to address to him later.
First, to get the matter in its right context, we should remember that the Select Committee was set up as a result of something the Prime Minister said to us as long ago as the debate on the Address at the beginning of this Parliament, when he dwelt at considerable length on the great merits there could be in such committees. It is interesting that he instanced three Departments—the Home Office, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Housing—as being suitable, but did not mention the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. But he made it very clear that he viewed this as an important departure and one that he hoped would be of real consequence. I wonder whether his hopes have been fulfilled.
The Select Committee on Agriculture was set up as a result of a Motion of the then Leader of the House on 14th December, 1966, when he made a number of comments on the new type of Select Committee. He drew a clear distinction, as is right, between the Select Committee on Agriculture and the one being set up on technology, because that dealt purely with the subject matter, and this Committee, as he emphasised, was the only one set up to study a Department, and it was Departmental study that the Prime Minister had spoken about originally. The right hon. Gentleman said:
It seems to me essential, if we are to restore the prestige and authority of the Commons, that we should give to the activities of these Committees the importance they deserve—…"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th December, 1966; Vol. 738, c. 487]
I assumed from that that he was very concerned that these Committees should have adequate powers to fulfil their duties, and that they should be carried out very thoroughly.
The Committee was set up on 30th January, 1967, many weeks after the

initial concept. One of the points made in its Report is the shortness of time it had to consider the problems. It would have been far better if it could have been set up somewhat earlier in the Parliamentary Session.
The Committee chose the subject of the Common Market. The first part of its Report deals solely with procedural matters, and it is these that I want to discuss first. The question of timing is very important. I have instanced the delay in setting the Committee up, and then there was the delay in debating its Report. I absolve the present Leader of the House and present Minister of Agriculture from criticism on that, but there has been very serious delay. I deplore most the fact, which the Minister mentioned, that the Committee's chairman cannot be present tonight. As the debate is arranged on a day when he could not be present, I assume that he was consulted. I hope that we shall be told whether he was, because it is quite monstrous that the very first Report of a Committee of this kind should be debated when the chairman is physically unable to be present in the House. I do not blame the chairman, but I question whether he was given adequate notice of the debate. The House is put at a great disadvantage if we do not have the chairman's advice.
I want to touch on the future of the Committee, which is set out in paragraph 5 of the Report. The paragraph makes it quite clear that the Committee is looking forward to its various problems, and it mentions a number that it wishes to discuss. It is at present engaged on further discussions, but I do not want to go into them because it would not be right to do so when dealing with the Report for the last Session. The paragraph says:
…Your Committee consider that a step should be taken towards establishing them on a more permanent basis by following the example of the Public Accounts and Estimates Committees…
Bearing that in mind, I was rather surprised at what the then Leader of the House said in the debate on procedure on 14th November last year. Dealing specifically with the Select Committee on Agriculture, he said:
…as we all know, the Agriculture Committee got involved in a long and arduous dispute, particularly with the Foreign Office,


about the limitations which can reasonably be placed on its functions by the Executive. I myself believe that this argument, as revealed in the Committee's Report,…ended in a very constructive definition of value to all Specialist Committees. However, the result was that the Committee did not manage to cover more than a tiny fraction of the Ministry's activities, and we have therefore proposed that it should spend a second year studying the Ministry of Agriculture before moving to other field of investigation."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th November, 1967; Vol. 754, c. 260.]
What on earth was meant by that? Does it mean that the Committee will be moved on to deal with other matters? Surely, it is a Select Committee on Agriculture and should devote its activities to that? If there are to be Select Committees dealing with other matters, they should be set up quite independently. It was never put forward as a Committee with a roving commission, and the whole purpose of having people who become expert on one Department will be defeated if this is to be done. I hope that we shall have repudiation at some stage, if not tonight, of what the then Leader of the House said, for otherwise the Committee is in a very dubious position at present, and paragraph 5 makes no sense in the context of what he then said.
The problems the Committee has had over staffing are quite extraordinary. Paragraph 6 makes it clear that it had one senior Clerk, with no supporting staff, and he had other duties. Many of us know that this Clerk has done wonders for the Committee, and we should salute what Mr. Taylor did during the period when he was working with the Committee, and place on record our gratitude to him. But at the same time he was working as secretary to the delegation to the Council of Europe, the W.E.U. and the N.A.T.O. Parliamentarians. How he was able to do those jobs effectively and still look after the interests of the Committee. I do not know.
The Government said at one stage that there was to be a Clerk with no other duties in charge of the Committee's activities. The then Minister without Portfolio, replying to the debate on 14th December, 1966, said of the Specialist Committees:
They will have a full-time clerk and authority co hire research."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th December, 1966; Vol. 738, c. 604].

A full-time clerk is no good if he is nearly full-time on other duties as well. The Government's promise for the Committee has not been fulfilled. Even now the situation is not satisfactory. I gather that a certain amount of extra help has been given, but this Session the Committee has Sub-Committees as well, which require additional staff. I ask the Government to examine this point.
Paragraph 13 deals with one of the
problems which arose, the question of supply of documents. We had no reply from the Ministry, and I do not think that we had it from the Minister just now, to the statement in paragraph 13:
(…five memoranda received from the Ministry just before the Committee met for the final consideration of their Draft Report had been originally requested at meetings on various dates up to as much as three months previously).
He said that there was a heavy burden on the Department. But he will appreciate that the Government themselves decided to set up these Committees and the amount of work that would be involved must have been known to them. To hold up a Committee all this time for memoranda must have made its task very difficult, and I hope that every effort will be made in future to keep memoranda up to date for the Committee.
In paragraph 15 we have the question of the correspondence. It says that the Committee
…asked to be supplied with copies of the correspondence concerning the application for assistance…
This application was from Sir James Marjoribanks—and there is a good deal of comment in the Report about it. The request by the Committee was made on 26th April and it took three months before this matter was resolved, and even then it was resolved in a far from satisfactory way to the Committee. Whatever the merits or demerits—and this is a Foreign Office point—of whether it was right to ask for this correspondence or, rather, whether it was correct to supply it in view of what the Foreign Office says was the confidential nature of some of the contents, surely the matter could have been resolved in far less than three months. That is a serious criticism.
Even when an opportunity came of providing this corrrespondence with names blacked out, the Foreign Office was not very forthcoming, to put it mildly. It did not produce its paper on staffing until


14th August, after the Committee had approved the draft of its Report. That is really absurd. A measure of criticism must be levelled at the Foreign Office about the delay which arose, quite apart from its refusal to produce the document, which I know irritated and annoyed hon. Members on both sides. We should have some explanation of that.
The other aspect which caused
tremendous difficulty was the proposed visit to Brussels. This is referred to in paragraph 17 onwards. It is a fantastic story from beginning to end. It is quite extraordinary to see the way this developed and the opposition which it evoked from Ministers at different stages. The comments of the Departments were published in November, in Command Paper No. 3479, paragraph 6 of which states:
…without the agreement of the Foreign Secretary, the Committee, through its Clerk, communicated directly with the Commission asking to be received by them.
I ask the House to note the phrasing:
…without the agreement of the Foreign Secretary, the Committee, through its Clerk, communicated directly…
It is as though there were something evil or wicked in the Committee's doing that. Why should not a Committee of this House communicate with whom it wishes? I could not help thinking, when I read this, of something I had seen in the House. In the "No" Lobby, I found what I was looking for. There is a display case there containing certain ancient documents of the House. Some of us show them to visiting constituents. One of these documents is the record of proceedings of 24th January, 1580, when Queen Elizabeth I expressed her
…great admiration for the rashness of this House in committing such an apparent contempt against Her Majesty's express commandment.
Is this not rather like the late Foreign Secretary expressing his indignation that a Committee of this House should dare to approach the E.E.C. Commission? In 1580, Mr. Speaker advised the House to apologise and confine itself in future to matters proper and pertinent to its functions, but on this occasion the function concerned was proper and pertinent to the Select Committee, and I find it amazing that a phrase of this kind should appear in the Government's reply. Of course the Committee was entitled to go to Brussels.

The Minister of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Frederick Mulley): I think that the Committee cannot have it both ways. The Committee complained, rightly or wrongly, that the Foreign Office had not made arrangements for its visit. I met the Committee informally and explained the situation. I found it extremely reasonable and it agreed that a formal visit of the kind indicated in its approach to the Commission could have been embarrassing. That is in its Report, so I am sure that that was its general view. The reply was only in response to how this tangled situation developed.

Mr. Godber: I was coming to that point. The way in which this passage is phrased made my eyebrows go up, and I am sure that it would raise the eyebrows of anyone considering the Report of the Committee. These Select Committees were set up to protect the House against the Executive in some degree, in the same way as in the battles with the Tudor and Stuart monarchs.
The right hon. Gentleman has made a point about how the matter arose. I take him up on that point in relation to the Government's reply. There is, surely, a serious discrepancy of fact, if nothing else, in relation to what is said in the Report. After the reports of the various meetings which he and Lord Chalfont had with members of the Committee, there is a full print of the letter which the then Lord President of the Council wrote.
Paragraph 9 then says:
When, in the light of this letter, the Committee asked whether informal contact between them and the European Commission could be arranged, the Foreign Office immediately arranged for members of the Committee to meet representatives of the Commission…
I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that this is not correct, because it was not in the light of this letter that the Committee asked for informal arrangements to be made. It was on 31st May that it made its request. When it was told by the right hon. Gentleman that a formal approach would be embarrassing, it immediately proposed that there should be an informal visit. That was when this approach was made.
It is untrue to say that
…in the light of this letter, the Committee asked whether informal contact…


could be made. It was in the light of its meeting with the right hon. Gentleman on 31st May, so I am informed, that the suggestion of an unofficial approach was made, and it was only after a further meeting with him and Lord Chalfont, after an edict, as it were, from the Foreign Secretary himself, that this action was taken. The reply is misleading in relation to the time factor, if nothing else.
The way this has developed and the response of the Government in relation to this visit make a sorry story and it is also strange to read, in paragraph 10 of the Reply, that
At no stage could there have been any objection to members of the Committee visiting the Commission in their capacity as Members of Parliament…
but apparently not as members of the Committee. I do not understand how being a member of this Committee should put anyone at a disadvantage in going to see the Commission. It is an extraordinary way to reward hon. Members on the Committee for all the extra time and work they have to put in. We should be told much more about this strange history.
It is an extraordinary state of affairs, and the Foreign Office does not emerge particularly well from it. However, a small number of members of the Committee did go. Even then there was some trouble, related in paragraph 23 of the Report. It really reads like a story from a Marx Brothers film. The unfortunate Chairman had to sit in the Chamber until 6.15 a.m. and, four hours later, go to London Airport to catch the plane to Brussels. That is an absurdity and the House should recognise it as such. Fortunately, on that aspect there is some encouragement in the Fifth Report of the House of Commons Services Committee, which says that it will no longer be necessary for the Chairman to sit all night to get permission to go to Brussels. We have gained something from the Report in that respect.
These are all matters which should be highlighted if we are to draw the correct lessons from the setting-up of this Committee. There are bound to be teething troubles, but unnecessary difficulties were put in the Committee's way. The Committee seems to have been set up late

again this Session and we do not know whether it will have adequate time for its task. More effort must be made to get it going at the start of a Session and to give it adequate time and staff to undertake its duties properly.
I apologise for having spent so much time on procedural matters, but these things must be got right for the future. I largely agree with what the Minister has to say about the content of the Report. The Ministry came out of these discussions reasonably well, although there are certain aspects with which I would deal if I had more time.
Some useful lessons can be learned. The Committee itself in paragraph 39 of its Report said that it had had a very useful document from the Ministry which might
not have been prepared but for the existence of the Committee. I do not know whether that is true, but it is fair to claim that the Committee's existence stimulated the Ministry into producing a very full report which has been of value.
There are one or two things in the Report with which I have never agreed, but it is mostly fair and I hope that when again the Common Market becomes a live political issue, as I hope it will, there will still be much to be learned from the Report. Devaluation has changed its character and it will have to be brought up to date, but what the Minister said about it was not in any sense an exaggeration.
Part 3 of the Report is a précis of the evidence. I marked several passages, particularly on page 85, with which I wanted to deal. I wanted to refer to cereal prices, but as that part of the Report has been invalidated by devaluation, I shall say only that I never accepted the Ministry's figures.
It is clear that if these Select Committees are to work effectively, they must have adequate power and staff and time and must not be obstructed unreasonably or unnecessarily by the Executive. But I am not yet fully convinced of their value. They have great possibilities, but far more time is needed to show whether they can fulfill them. I have never thought that the American system of committee procedure was particularly appropriate to us, but I am always ready to learn from the efforts of my colleagues, and I salute them all for what they have done.
I am sure that all members of the Committee worked diligently and conscientiously, and they deserved more help from the Executive than they received. There has been a heavy call on the energies of the Ministry and it would be interesting to know how many people are involved in servicing a Committee of this nature. It would help to give us some idea of the total cost of Committees of this kind if that sort of information could be provided.
The Committee has succeeded in establishing the new principle of a Select Committee operating in this way and meeting regularly in public to the advantage of those concerned. It has established the principle of a Minister of the Crown taking an active part in the work of a Select Committee. It has established, I think, freedom of action for the Committee to travel and hear evidence from whomever it wishes. Those are three useful things which have been established, whatever the content and subject matter of the Report. To that extent, this is an innovation which is paying dividends and I salute the members of the Committee and thank them for what they have done.

7.56 p.m.

Mr. John P. Mackintosh: I shall try to deal with some of the issues raised by the right hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Godber) in the absence of the chairman of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Tudor Watkins) who asked me to say a word or two on his behalf. I am not absolutely sure about the timing, but he received a summons to a tribunal in his constituency, the kind of thing which no hon. Member could possibly ignore, almost exactly at the moment when the Government were considering the timing of the debate.
No blame falls on anybody. This is one of these regrettable conflicts of allegiance which occasionally arise in the life of hon. Members, and the Chairman of the Committee could not be more sorry that he was not able to present the Report himself. I am sure that we will all echo what the right hon. Member for Grantham and the Minister have said in commending the splendid chairmanship of my hon.

Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor.
I was relieved to hear my right hon. Friend the Minister for Agriculture say that he thought that the Committee had been a success and had done its job properly. I hope that he will maintain that attitude when we consider the future of the Committee in subsequent Sessions. In reply to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Grantham, who wondered why this debate should arise now, may I point out that one of the reasons is that, with the reform of the procedure of the House, the Finance Bill has been sent upstairs, a reform which has permitted more time for debates on the Floor of the House. Hon. Members opposite cannot have it both ways—if we had been bogged down in Finance Bill debates, there would not have been time for a debate on the Floor of the House on a critical Report of this kind, and for other important matters.
The opening part of the Report describes the lessons to be learned from the first of the Select Committees which have become known as Specialist Committees. First, the Committee was purely sessional and not a continuing Committee. It was appointed only four months before Parliament rose and, although it could have sat through the Summer Recess, in many ways that was impracticable, and it was left with a mere four months in which to complete its work. Those who make criticisms of certain aspects of its work should remember this restriction of time.
In this Session the Committee was not appointed until January, so that it was not able to start its work until late in the Session. It is doubtful whether it will be able to do its work adequately in the time at its disposal. I hope that the Government will take action to make it a continuing Committee, so that if it cannot complete its work this Session it can continue next Session.
The national composition of the Committee may not be a matter of concern to the whole House, but an important issue was raised. There was an attempt to prevent Scottish Members from sitting on the Committee, on the ground that as the Committee was considering the work of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food it was dealing with a Ministry whose duties were confined to England and Wales.
This raised the very critical point of principle that all Members are Members of this House, with an equal right to discuss subjects, whether restricted to their own area or to others. I am glad that this point was dropped after some consultation and certain Scottish Members added to the Committee. May I say that, in the light of the subsequent experience of the Committee, when more Scottish Members had been added, if some of us had not been there the Committee might have ceased to operate at certain times—[Interruption.] If the Welsh Members had also been excluded, I hate to think of what would have happened.
In our Report we make reference to the usefulness in future, if this type of Committee continues, as we hope it will, of considering agricultural topics which are the responsibility of the Secretary of State for Scotland, because there is great value in looking at slightly different methods of administering the same matters, some in the hands of the Scottish Office, some in the hands of the English Ministry.
As a Scottish Member, I believe that the best approach to the Scottish problems is to link them with the equivalent administration in the United Kingdom, rather than to treat them in a separate Specialist Committee which will wander off over nine different topics and perhaps lack the expertise in the framework of reference that one gets from concentrating on a single subject of this kind.
The question of staff is of great importance. There were some rather curious differences of opinion shown in Ministers' statements and replies to the Committee when it took up this question with senior Ministers. As the right hon. Member for Grantham said, we were given the part-time services of one of the most able Clerks in the House, to whose assiduity we have paid tribute. I can see that he is getting embarrassed by this, but it is not satisfactory that we were given the part-time services of one Clerk. The same has been the case this Session.
I have been told by the Lord President
of the Council that this was our fault, because we had not pressed hard enough for full-tine staff. That is all very well, but the Committee has pressed, again and again. Even one full-time Clerk is

not sufficient. We require more than that. We require someone to keep, collect and anotate the vast amount of material flowing through the Committee; we require the services of a research assistant if the Committee is in any way to match a Department and not waste its time. I had the embarrassment of going to a department of agriculture in a university and listening to people asking, "Why, when you had the officials up, did you ask this unimportant question instead of getting down to that and the next thing?"
The answer is simply that we are full-time Members of Parliament, with constituencies, and other committees, masses of correspondence and business. Most of us can only devote one or two days a week to the work of such a Committee, and without expert assistance, collating and sifting material, we can neither make the best use of the Committee from the point of view of the House of Commons, nor can we utilise and save the time of the staff of the Department, and the other expert witnesses appearing before us.
It has been asked: why should not the Committee have a civil servant as a member of its staff, seconded from the Department? I must comment on this view because, it is vitally important that when these Committees are properly staffed, as I trust they will be, the staff should come from the Department of the Clerk of the House of Commons or the Library, or be specially hired, as conflicts of loyalty can arise which would be quite unsatisfactory in the case of a seconded civil servant. This actually occurred in the history of this Committee, and I shall refer to it later in discussing the comic, almost Marx Brothers aspects of the problems of visiting Brussels.
At one point in this episode a Minister from the Foreign Office telephoned the Clerk and said to him:
I wish to ask you the following questions and convey the following information in confidence. This must not be revealed to the members of the Committee.
The Clerk was not very happy at my revealing this fact—he was reluctant to have it revealed. But I think that it is in the interests of the House that we mention this and discuss it. I told him that I took the view that I should mention this in my speech. In this case, a Minister


rang up a Clerk to a Committee to impart information, to ask questions and then said:
By the way, do not tell the members of the Committee this.
As it happens the Clerk took the right view, that he was a servant of the House, not of the Minister, and revealed these matters carefully and promptly to the members of the Committee. This illustrates the vital importance of these officials being members of the staff of this House, so that such conflicts of loyalty cannot cause any serious difficulty.
I now come to the difficulties that the Committee had in obtaining information and pursuing its activities, particularly about this question, set out in the terms of reference, of its right to have power to send for persons, papers and records. It is important that Ministers consider precisely what meaning is to be attached to this and that the House considers this, too. As the Committee proceeded, we asked for certain papers from the Foreign Office and were simply denied them.
When we asked why we were denied these, no reason was given. There was some argument that they contained remarks about the personal character or capacities of individual civil servants. The Committee wished to meet the Foreign Office on this matter and said that it would be quite content to have those papers with the substantial matters of fact in which it was interested, with any reference to the private capacities of civil servants deleted or blacked out. Alternatively, we suggested that the Chairman of the Committee should see the papers in private, as this has been done on other occasions and he would simply report their contents to the Committee. All these suggestions were turned down and we got a reply, a Departmental Observation which said:
…but Government Departments cannot accept a general obligation to produce all papers for which a Parliamentary Committee asks, particularly "—
and I emphasise these words—
those relating to internal administration.
It is precisely the internal administration of a Department which we were set up to investigate. The Foreign Office says that it cannot produce all papers. What papers will it produce? What are the criteria? How do we know that, as

a result, papers will never be revealed no matter what the Committee wants? We need a proper definition of this power, conveyed in the Order in quite absolute terms. What is the capacity of the Government to limit and restrict the Committee's powers in any particular way?
In many ways this was the most serious and important procedural problem encountered by the Committee, because for future Committees this access to papers is absolutely vital. No hon. Members wish to get at confidential matters which might have an adverse bearing on the safety, the negotiations, or the security of the country. We wanted comments on the staffing position which was something purely internal, revealing nothing secret, but which was essential to the work of the Committee. There can be no argument whatever that there was anything in these matters which could not be properly revealed to a House of Commons Committee. We stand today without adequate explanation of this matter.

Mr. Peter Bessell: Would the hon. Gentleman agree that the important aspect of this is that at no time did the Foreign Office suggest that security questions were involved, and that, therefore, in those circumstances, its behaviour was really quite incomprehensible?

Mr. Mackintosh: The hon. Member is quite right. No question of security was ever suggested. The questions referred to individuals with which the Committee dealt, by exempting them specifically. When the final request was put no answer was given. There was simply a refusal to comment or explain these matters. This is a most unsatisfactory situation, of which we would like a full explanation from the Government, and a clear record of what is the position for the future.
On the second procedural aspect, that of the trip to Brussels, this has been fairly comprehensively dealt with by the right hon. Member for Grantham. There are, however, one or two other aspects which we ought to consider. He carefully explained that the statement in the Departmental Observations, in paragraph 9 that
…the Foreign Office immediately arranged for members of the Committee to meet representatives of the Commission…
was, to put it mildly, inaccurate, and that obstructions were raised to the work of


the Committee until the very last minute. We need to go back a little before then, and see the record of difficulties which the Committee had in this matter and to explain the lengths to which the Committee went to meet any reasonable objections that the Government could have had. I say that because I wish to make it clear that the Committee was not interested in making difficulties or unreasonable requests. It was interested only in doing its work.
Originally, the Committee wrote to the Commission and said that it wished to go as early as 26th April. The reason why the Government was drawn into this matter—and here I should like to correct my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Park (Mr. Mulley)—was that the E.E.C. contacted the British mission in Brussels and said, "Precisely what does your Parliamentary Committee wish to talk about?" Therefore, the matter came within the purview of the Foreign Office, which sat on it and held it up for two months.
There then took place a series of meetings at which the Committee explained its position to officials. Each time we received satisfactory replies, only to return to square one once the Ministry officials had returned to the Foreign Office.
On 31st May members of the Committee met the Minister of State at the Foreign Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Park. They explained that there was no desire to embarrass the Government, which might then have been entering into negotiations with members of the Commission for British entry to the Common Market. It was clearly explained that we wished only to ask about certain matters of fact concerning the application of the agricultural policy and that if this would cause embarrassment or could possibly be misinterpreted by Governments unfriendly to this country and not wishing to facilitate British entry, we would go officially to see our legation in Brussels and have informal contacts with the agricultural Members of the Commission.
Incidentally, members of the Committee had had informal contacts as private individuals or as members of party delegations. It is extremely humiliating for the House of Commons if a Committee of the House cannot go when committees of the Conservative Party and Labour Party and committees run by

sundry foundations can go with no misunderstanding of their purpose. To suggest that men like M. Mansholt, a man of great distinction and knowledge of European institutions, would be confused between the appearance of a Parliamentary Committee and an official negotiating delegation from the Foreign Office is ridiculous and underestimates M. Mansholt, who understood fully what we were after. There was no problem of communications or any doubt about why we wanted to go in M. Mansholt's mind or in the minds of Ministers when we explained the matter on 31st May. We received no adequate reply.
There was a change of Minister before the next meeting on 14th June. We had an interview with Lord Chalfont, who had misunderstood our purpose. We explained the matter again. He said that it was a reasonable request. Again, he went back to the Foreign Office. Again, we got no further. On 21st June, we had a second meeting with Lord Chalfont, with the same result. Then we had a meeting with the Lord President of the Council, who had not been informed of what had taken place on the three previous occasions. He adduced many interesting arguments, including the argument that the Treasury could not afford the fares to Brussels. When the members of the Committee suggested that they might pay their own fares, there was a certain amount of embarrassment, and the Lord President decided that there were other difficulties. He informed us that we could go to Brussels if a limited number went as individuals, but we insisted on going as a Committee, and it was finally agreed that we would go as a Sub-Committee of the full Committee.
To say at this stage, as the official reply does, that thereafter all was sweetness and light and that the Foreign Office helped all along the line is something of an exaggeration. As we were attempting to board the aeroplane at Heathrow, the voice over the loudspeaker summoned the Clerk to the Committee to the telephone. We joined him eagerly around the telephone and heard the voice of Lord Chalfont asking what our intention was, where we were going and how we were setting about it. When we again explained the matter to him, he said that no official assistance could be given to us.
When we got to Brussels, after this interesting series of episodes, the Head of the British delegation, Sir James Marjoribanks, was, needless to say, extremely helpful. Our sessions with him enormously facilitated the work of the Committee. The private informal meeting which we had with M. Mansholt enlightened us on many detailed points.
As we were looking into the question of how far the Ministry of Agriculture fully comprehended the regulations of the Common Market, how they would apply in practice to British agriculture and the effect which they would have, it seemed only reasonable that, having heard the Ministry's expert and able evidence as to how the regulations work, we should ask the people who made the regulations whether they accepted that this was how they worked in practice and whether it was a correct interpretation, not of British agriculture, but of the regulations. We wanted to know which regulations were important and which were peripheral. These, naturally, were the sort of things which any investigating committee should ascertain.
I hope that the lesson of all this is that it is safe to let Committees of the House do this kind of work and that obstacles will not be placed in their way again. That concludes my immediate points about the procedural aspect.
I was very glad that, at the beginning of his speech, the right hon. Member for Grantham welcomed the Committee and criticised, as I am doing, the Government for giving inadequate aid and support to it. I was very relieved to hear him say that because I thought that it meant that he realised the value of the Committee. Much that he said suggested that. However, at the end he entered a caveat: he was not yet fully convinced of the value of Committees of this type. I suppose that that was a saving clause so that if some day he finds himself on the Government Front Bench he can take the same view of the Committee which Labour Ministers have sometimes taken. I hope that that is not the case.
If right hon. and hon. Members opposite defend and support the Committee, they should make it clear that they will do so in all circumstances. I should

welcome a statement from the right hon. Gentleman on that point.

Mr. Godber: Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that he anticipates that I shall soon be sitting on the Government Front Bench?

Mr. Mackintosh: I do not anticipate that for a moment, but I should like to know whether right hon. and hon. Members opposite are prepared to say one thing now and another thing in three or four years' time. It is extremely important that we achieve a certain amount of cross-party agreement in these matters.
I was a little disappointed that the debate began with a defence by the Government and with an official reply by the Opposition. I do not think that this should be necessary when we are debating a Report of this kind. It would be unfortunate if the Reports of these Committees were bandied across the Floor of the House in a party fashion. Their purpose is to provide material to enable all hon. Members to take part in debates. It would have been better if the customary procedure had been followed of allowing the Chairman of the Committee or someone speaking on his behalf to open the debate.
I return to the question raised by the Minister about the work of the Committee. He said that the load on the Department was extremely great and that it took the time of many senior officials. The object of a Committee of this kind is to find out what arguments are going on in the Government and what priorities exist among the officials in the Department and to get behind the facade of Ministerial unanimity and responsibility which is normally maintained. This is the constitutional innovation attempted by such Committees. The only way in which it can be carried out is to attempt to break into the thinking of officials who naturally try to present a unanimous and single viewpoint. Therefore, what may appear to be a petty argument about staffing may become critical if we have to ascertain the difference in priorities between, say, the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Agriculture.
On the question of the load on officials, if one is worried about what an official is saying, there is a temptation for a Committee to say, "Do a paper on this". But what one wants is not a paper but


more forthcoming evidence from the officials. One turns to a paper if one is not getting at the root of the matter.
I hope that in a year or two's time, when officials realise that a Select Commitee offers a method of opening up a discussion on policy which it is in the public interest to undertake, then, rather than attempt to preserve a complete stonewall front and give out official explanations, they will say, "It could be this or it might be that and we on the whole think such and such. We have some evidence for this and some evidence for that. We prefer this solution to the problem". If they would be prepared to do this the Committee would not say, "What research have you done? Produce a paper. Let us have the facts". We would all proceed a great deal faster. I am not blaming the officials, but this is one of the things which we, as a Committee, have learned to do. I feel that this is one of the reasons why some of the extra work has been put on the Department.
I turn to the content of the Report. If there had been no Select Committee, it is certain that we would have had no White Paper and no mass of information of this kind.
My hon. Friend the Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton), on 6th December, 1966, asked the Prime Minister
if he will issue instructions to all the appropriate Government Departments to supply adequate factual information on the implications of joining the European Economic Community"—[OFFICAL REPORT, 6th December, 1966; Vol. 737, c. 1148.]
The Prime Minister replied that it is very difficult to have a series of separate pamphlets from different Departments, and therefore he declined the suggestion.
I suggest, therefore, that it is because this committee was set up that we got information which the Ministry already had. I do not dispute that they had this information, but we got it out for the benefit of farmers, the public, journalists, and those interested in the problem of British relations in the Common Market. We got this material out and investigated the matter. I do not think that this debate should become an argument about the pros and cons of joining Europe, and I was pleased that the Committee never

degenerated into this. We asked about the factual implications.
I should like now to comment on some of the matters to which the Minister referred. The Committee was worried about the lack of flexibility in the interpretation of the implications of joining the E.E.C. I think this was a correct criticism to make of the Department's approach. If one is to understand anything in politics or the application of laws or rules, one must know which are essential, which can be adapted and which are purely contingent to the circumstances at that moment. To treat them all as of equal value, from the point of view of officials, is a safeguard against injecting their own opinions or estimates into the matter, but it may not give an accurate picture.
My impression, after going to Brussels, was that the sort of picture we got of the Common Market agricultural arrangements was the sort of picture one would have got of the Catholic Church if one had studied purely the encyclicals of the Pope and never looked at the way in which the Church acted in the various territories in which it worked. It is the sort of picture which many African students, whom I used to teach, had of the British constitution. They would point out that the Queen could veto laws and do this and that and say there was no law against it. That is true, but one wanted to know how the constitution or set of rules worked in practice.
We said in the Report that on certain aspects an explanation of the regulations did not fully bring this out. The best example concerns milk. The milk regulation, as M. Mansholt explained, was a contingency regulation concerned with the needs of the existing members of the Six. It would have been contrary to their interests had the same regulation been maintained after a country with a totally different milk production pattern had entered the Common Market. This was the sort of regulation which would be changed without difficulty and without difficult negotiations. There were other regulations which would
require negotiation to change and there were others which were central to the principles of the Common Market which would not have been changed. We felt that this picture had not been fully brought out


in the White Paper. We thought—and I think on reflection this was correct—that the White Paper did not explain what the implications would have been after joining the Market—the dynamic as opposed to the static implications.
This is a long subject. I will not elaborate, but I will say, finally, on content, that we established that there was a lack of sufficient information from agricultural attachés in the member countries in the Common Market, that there had been an over-concentration on the Common Market as viewed from Brussels, and too little about the precise impact on French, Italian and German agriculture, and, therefore, what we could expect in the way of impact on British agriculture and what kind of adaptations were to be expected.
In saying this, it is unfortunate, but inevitable, that an implication is cast that we are criticising officials. Some officials may have felt that we pressed them too hard. I think that all members of the Committee felt that the individual officials that we had before us were as hard working and expert and able as one could find, but it was our duty to investigate the degree of priority their work had, and the sort of interpretations being placed on it by the Minister. It is part of our duty as a countervailing force, which the House of Commons is or should be in such matters, to press and push. We understand the position of officials and there is no element of individual criticism.
I conclude by returning to my original point, which is the security of Committees of this kind. If anything was proved by the work of this Committee, it was the value and the need for getting this kind of information. There was a debate on the Floor of the House on the implications of joining the Common Market on the 8th, 9th and 10th May of last year, and a number of papers and journals commented on the poor quality of information produced by Members on both sides of the House in arguing about the Common Market. The answer, I submit, is that we had not got this report available before the debate. Nor had we reports from the Board of Trade or the Ministry of Social Security. There was only one thin White Paper produced on certain legal implications. If hon. Members are to debate matters as complicated as the

Common Market they must have this work done for them and have the information produced so that misapprehensions can be removed from our minds and then from the minds of the public.
The critical matter, as I have said, is the security of the Committee and its membership in future. It is at present only a Sessional Committee. We have already had experience of, not tampering, but arrangements affecting membership which could have had a very adverse effect on the working of the Committee It is essential that a Committee like this should be left alone and that those members who are developing some little expertise should' be allowed to remain on the Committee Session by Session so that it can carry on with its work and become a body of informed opinion. Yet we had a long delay before the reappointment of the Committee and the coercion—it was coercion, because this is what hon. Members have told me—of nine further members to raise the membership from 16 to 25.
The 16 members had been co-operating satisfactorily and there had been a high degree of attendance. The Committee worked well and satisfactorily. The reason for the addition of the extra nine members was never explained. We are told by members of
the Government who dislike Specialist Committees that it is difficult to find hon. Members to serve on them. The standard arguments are trotted out about not being able to man Committees. If that is so, why assemble extra members who are not needed? This is very peculiar. When those extra members met they realised that if the Committee were 25 strong further attempts at careful cross-examination would fall to pieces, so all but one or two decided not to attend. I am not suggesting we are not grateful for the attendance of those one or two extra members, because we have found their membership valuable. I am merely asking: why build up a Committee beyond a useful working number? A number of members decided to stay away or to concentrate on the Sub-Committees, and I am sure that if the Committee is ever cashiered we will be told that poor attendance is evidence that the Committee has not worked satisfactorily. The fact is that it is working very well indeed, and we want an assurance that we will continue Session by Session as a continuing Committee.
I should like the Minister to deal specifically with that, and also with the curious remark—to which the right hon. Member for Grantham referred—by the Lord President of the Council on 14th November:
Our original intention was that a Departmental Committee should spend one Session on each Department and then move on."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th November, 1967; Vol. 754, c. 260.]
That was contrary to the idea of having Specialist Committees. The whole point of the word "Specialist" is that one continues to investigate the same topic. If we move from one Department to another, the whole principle of the Specialist Committees will collapse, as it will if the Committee is allowed to lapse.
At one time when the Lord President of the Council discussed Specialist Committees, he took the view that we should not be like the old Estimates Committee, moving from one subject to another, because that is what it does. That is the major reason for the weakness of the Estimates Committee, and I trust it will be made clear that this Committee is to continue, on the subject of agriculture because, as the Minister said, it is a great success.
I have dealt with the question of the burden of work on officials, but I should like to make the broader point that officials work very hard dealing with farmers' unions, with preparing legislation and statistics, and with pressure groups, and it is, therefore, only reasonable that they should do the same amount of hard work to explain their policies to the public through a Select Committee. That is not too much to ask.
We asked the Ministry whether it had ever costed the amount of work put into the Annual Price Review. We were told that that was impossible. I am sure that the Ministry is costing the work put into this Specialist Committee in case they need to make a case that it should not continue. We will watch that with extreme care, because if the Committee ceases to exist the Government's faith in Parliamentary reform will be disbelieved. This is the touchstone. These Committees are the one effective agency out of the whole gamut of Parliamentary reform left to back benchers, the one method by which we can probe and make good use of our time by questioning the Gov-

ernment. If the Committee ceases to exist Parliamentary reform as put forward by the Lord Presilent of the Council and the Deputy Leader of the House will be dead. Everyone ought to realise that and do everything possible to keep Specialist Committees going.

8.31 p.m.

Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine: It is a pleasure to have the privilege of being called immediately after the excellent speech of the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh). It is not often that we are able to say to an hon. Gentleman opposite that we hope we are not embarrassing him if we say that we agree with nearly everything he said.
At the beginning of his speech the hon. Gentleman said that if the Finance Bill had been taken on the Floor of the House, and we were bogged down with it, we would not have had the pleasure of taking part in this debate. I ought perhaps to tell him that there are at least two hon. Members present, of whom I am one, who have the best of both worlds in that we are involved in the deliberations of the Finance Bill Committee, and also have the pleasure of being here tonight.
I am not sure that I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it would be a good thing if Scottish matters were considered
by the Select Committee on Agriculture. I think that some Members would feel that if we are to deal with matters affecting Scotland there should be a sub-committee of the main Committee for that purpose.
I associate myself with everything that has been said about the absence of the Chairman of the Committee. I find it incomprehensible that we are having a debate of this importance in the absence of our chairman, who put in so much hard work which was appreciated by both sides of the Committee. When we get this kind of problem, the usual answer is that the matter will be discussed through the usual channels. On this occasion, however, the Leader of the House could surely have had a discussion with himself and discovered that tomorrow night there is to be a debate on fish which could easily have taken place tonight, and we could then have discussed today's topic tomorrow when


the Chairman of the Committee would have been present. There would not have been any difficulty about the usual channels. It would have been a matter simply for the Leader of the House. I am very disappointed that our Chairman is not present.
I want to make only three points, and I shall make them briefly because they have been referred to already. I can perhaps be even more brief than I expected when I came into the Chamber.
If a Committee of this sort is to be effective, there must be a new approach to the way in which we carry out our deliberations. The Minister told us with some pride that during the Committee's Sittings 33 memoranda were submitted
by his Department. He said that that meant a heavy load of work for his Department. Since he is not here, I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will convey to him my belief that this also provides considerable work for those on the Committee. In the current Session, I have already received 36 documents—

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. James Hoy): My right hon. Friend was not complaining about the load of work but was simply recording the amount entailed to show how much it was. Obviously, if he had prepared it, he hoped that the members of the Committee would at least do those who had prepared it the courtesy of reading it.

Mr. Godman Irvine: I entirely agree. I understood the Minister to be claiming that a good deal of work had been done by his Department, and I am saying that if those documents are to be read by the Members of the Committee, they, too, have to put in a good deal of work.
In the current Session, in only four months, we have already received 36 documents. One of the more recent with an annex was the statement of the National Union of Agricultural Workers. The hon. Member for Norfolk, North (Mr. Hazell), who is present, will have read it and will know all about it, but other Members of the Committee have to read not only the document itself but the accompanying memorandum. That is why I feel that the point of the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian

was so important. If we are to make use of the material made available to us, and if we are to ask the right questions of our witnesses, we need more assistance.
During the last Session we had the services of Mr. Taylor, who gave us all that we could have asked from one man. Hon. Members on both sides have paid their tributes to his capacity and willing service. I would like to add mine. It has also been pointed out that he had other responsibilities, and it is asking far too much of one man to service a Committee of this sort on a part-time basis.
Equally, if we are to have this vast volume of documents to consider, we need not only further assistance from the Clerks, but also the type of assistance which the hon. Gentleman mentioned, to enable us to get the full benefit of those documents so that we make use of them and ask the right questions. Therefore, much of this work is, at the moment, being wasted because we cannot make full use of the documents.
If we had someone to annotate them and
help us to extract the real information which they contain and which we should put to the Departments, we should be much more effective. We need more staff and more assistance.
That brings me to the hon. Gentleman's observations about the size of the Committee. In its last Session, we were much more effective than we can hope to be in the present Session. I hope that when these matters are considered for another Session, there will be no thought of having a Committee of the present size. That is leading to further inefficiency and is making it impossible for us to do our work.
I turn now to the visit to Europe. I
and many members of the Committee have been to Europe and seen the Commission, so we took a somewhat aloof and academic interest in the discussions about the Committee going to Europe. But, having had the advantage of going there and discussing these matters with officials in Brussels, I should have thought that, at the very beginning of the last Session, the right thing was for us to go as a Committee to Brussels. Then, we would have been able to see how these things were organised and we would not be working merely from the documents and trying to see what the regulations said.
Had we done that, we would more quickly have discovered the difficulties under which some of the officials were labouring. They had to read the documents and say, from their experience, what would happen if they were put into action. But they had not had the discussions to which the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian referred. They had not discussed, for example, the question of how milk was organised in the Community. Had that discussion taken place, we would not have got into difficulty over the question of milk. Going to Brussels was a vital part of the organisation of the Committee and it was not until somewhat later in our deliberations that the proposal arose of our wanting to go to Europe.
In the Departmental Observations we are told on page 2:
When members of a Select Committee travel abroad it inevitably puts itself in a position where its presence at a particular time in a particular place may prejudice the Government's negotiations".
There were no Government negotiations taking place at that time. Most of us had been to Brussels without embarrassing the Government and I believe that it would have been most valuable had the Government co-operated and seen that the Committee went to Brussels to see what was happening there.

Mr. Bessell: Would not the hon. Gentleman agree that the statement he quoted is a reflection on the integrity of the Committee and implies that had we gone to Brussels as a Committee we might have embarrassed the Government, which we would not have wished to do?

Mr. Godman Irvine: That is the point I was making. Most of us managed to get ourselves to and from Brussels without embarrassing anybody and the fact that we went as a Committee does not seem to add anything to the point made by the Government.

Mr. Mulley: Surely both the hon. Gentleman and the members of the Committee realise that there is an enormous difference between going in their individual capacities as members of the Committee or Members of Parliament and going as a Select Committee of this House. They undervalue their importance and the importance of Select Committees If they think that going in their

corporate capacity and taking evidence in a formal way is not different from a Member of Parliament dropping in on Brussels, as it were.

Mr. Godman Irvine: The Minister of State made that point when we saw him. That argument has been used on several occasions but I remain unconvinced. Members of a Select Committee are not wild animals who will rush around making a nuisance of themselves. If hon. Members are appointed to a Select Committee, Ministers should assume that they are responsible people who may be let loose at least as far from home as Brussels without causing anybody embarrassment.
If the Minister is not persuaded by my arguments thus far, he might be interested to know that I completely fail to follow why it took two months for us to be given an answer. What is more, we then had the privilege of seeing not only the Minister of State but the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor, whereupon another three or four weeks passed before we got any further. There was, therefore, a delay of three months before the Foreign Office decided what it would do.
Then we had the ridiculous business of the telephone conversation about what happened at Heathrow on the very morning the Committee was leaving. We had the other unfortunate aspect of the Chairman of the Committee having to come to the House at 6.15 in the morning to get permission to leave, followed by the extraordinary business of him having a Motion on the Order Paper which, by mischance, was not put—I say it was not put because no doubt it was called—and having to return to the House for a second time to obtain the required permission.
Paragraph 23 of the Report reads:
So, however, was the next motion on the Order Paper, giving precisely similar powers to the Science and Technology Committee and standing in the name of the Chairman of that Committee, despite the fact that he was not present and notwithstanding the rule which had given the Agriculture Committee so much trouble".
So the Chairman of the Science and Technology Committee, although he was not present in the House, was given facilities which were denied to the Chairman of the Agriculture Committee a day or two previously. That shows quite


clearly that the Government were not giving to this Committee the support which it deserved.
Exactly the same thing happened in relation to the documents. Two months elapsed before a reply was received from the Government. A further four weeks elapsed after a reply had been received, and a total of 13 weeks had elapsed from the time we asked for the documents until 26th July when the final refusal was given.
The documents which we were asking to see contained confidential reports on the character of some members of the Department of Agriculture If the Chairman of a Select Committee is not a fit person to see documents of such small national importance, it seems to me that there are very few documents which a Select Committee can be allowed to see. If it takes 13 weeks for the Government to reach a decision that seems to disclose a serious lack of co-operation.
Those are the three points which I would like to lay before the House for consideration. The first is that we must look again at the amount of assistance that is available to the Committee. The second matter is the way in which the visit to Europe was handled. The third is the length of time which elapsed in connection with the documents which could surely have been shown to the chairman.

8.47 p.m.

Dr. John Dunwoody: The deliberations of this Committee have provided for those of us who have been able to take part in them an exciting and valuable Parliamentary experience. I would pay tribute to the Ministry of Agriculture, whose co-operation throughout our deliberations, both at Ministerial and at Civil Service level, was of considerable value to us. As we have heard, this degree of co-operation was not perhaps so marked with some other Government Departments with which we had to deal. This was perhaps inevitable with an experimental Committee such as this. Indeed, one could suggest that it was right and proper that there should be differences of opinion, and that if there had not been differences of opinion such as we were faced with it

would mean that we as a Committee were less effective.
I will concentrate on the first part of our Report, which deals with the work of the Committee and with the procedure by which we produced the Report. Before I do so, I would say that I wish that we had been able to debate the Report at an earlier date. This is an exceedingly important Parliamentary experiment. We are one of the first two Specialist Committees to be appointed. We are the first to have reported, and the first on whose Report the Government have produced an Opinion, and yet we have had to wait too long before we have had an all too brief opportunity to debate the Report. I hope that in the future there will be some guarantee by the Government that time will be found to debate Specialist Committees' Reports as soon as possible after publication.
When we first met, we discussed the various subjects about which we could have talked. We deliberately chose one which to an extent was provocative and in the mainstream of politics. Some of us felt that it was only in this way that we could test the concept of a Specialist Committee. It would have been easy to have chosen one of a number of subjects suggested to us which would have been less controversial and not involved us in such battles with our Ministerial colleagues. But it would not have produced a Report as valuable as this one, nor would it have provided the experience of the Specialist Committee concept with which we can come here today.
Turning to the membership of the Committee, and particularly the point raised about the recent rapid increase in the number of members, we started with a mere 14. We then increased to 16, to bring in two of our Scottish colleagues. I do not object to that, but it is a little anomalous that we are not able to discuss Scottish affairs. It seems extraordinary, for example, that, every time raspberries are mentioned, the subject is ruled out of order, because raspberries grow in Scotland. Now that we have more than two Scottish members, I think that the time has come when our deliberations might cover the whole of Great Britain.
As for the increase to 25 members, as my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick


and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh) said, hon. Members have been press-ganged into becoming members of the Committee. This is at a time when we hear complaints from all sides about the pressure of Committee work upstairs and at a time when many of us find that we have three or four simultaneous engagements on mid-week mornings. It is regrettable that it has happened, and I am prompted to ask why it has happened. I doubt if it was at the request of our Chairman or with the willing acquiescence of previous members. Then again, if we have increased our membership to 25, why has not the other Specialist Committee?
As has been said already, our staffing is inadequate, and it is essential that the staffing of these Committees should be independent of the Executive. The staff should be responsible to the members of the Committee and to the House rather than to some outside body. In this connection, I endorse what has been said already about the quality of our Clerk, Mr. John Taylor, who did a truly remarkable job in most difficult circumstances at certain times.
Our meetings were held in public. Initially, there were doubts in the minds of some of us as to whether that was wise and might not inhibit some of our witnesses. It should not be forgotten that we were interviewing and questioning senior civil servants who were not accustomed to this over a period of hours. I think that it was a welcome and valuable innovation and that it proved not to be a restriction on any of the witnesses who came before us. It demonstrated to the general public and to the Press who were present the quality of some of the people whom we interviewed.
The supply of documents has been mentioned already. I can only underline the anxiety which has been expressed by hon. Members on both sides of the House, first, at our inability to obtain documents which I feel that the House would wish us to have obtained and, second, at the great delay even in being informed that we were not to attain them.
We first applied for certain documents about the staffing of our delegation in Brussels on 26th April. It dragged on and, eventually, on 26th July, we received our final refusal with an offer of a paper. That paper was given to us on 14th

August, when we were all in Recess and when our Report was complete. We faced the same sort of delay in our attempts to visit Brussels. In the end, we were successful in that five of us got there, which was just sufficient to make up a quorum.
We first wrote to the E.E.C. on 22nd March. Over two months elapsed without a reply. Eventually, a protest was made to the Foreign Office here, and that produced the suggestion of a compromise. Meetings took place. On 21st June, we were told that there were strong objections to our visit and that it would not be permitted to take place. Further discussions eventually produced a compromise, and we were informed that a limited number could go for a short time but that our contacts with officials should be on an unofficial basis. On that understanding, eventually we set off.
We have heard already of the extraordinary experience through which our chairman had to go. Not only had he to be here at 6.15 in the morning to obtain the Motion which enabled us to leave for Brussels three or four hours later that day; but he had to sit here all night on the night before when we had what was probably the most important meeting of the Select Committee. I do not think that is the sort of way in which the House should treat the Chairman of an important Committee such as this.
As the House has heard, our troubles were not over when we left the Central Lobby and climbed into our taxis to go to London Airport. We thought they were over, but we had the extraordinary episode at London Airport to which I must devote a minute or two. We arrived at the airport, went through documentation and into the departure lounge and were about to walk down the ramp to the plane when a call came over the telephone to our Clerk. He was asked by the Minister of State for his views on our intentions when we got to Brussels.
I understand that the Minister of State also expressed his view that we might be disappointed at what we found when we got there. Perhaps more seriously and significantly, he suggested to the Clerk that the Clerk should not tell the Committee of the origin or nature of the telephone call. Our Clerk naturally, as I think any Clerk of this House would


do, refused to give that assurance and he told us of the nature and origin of the call.
It was a serious situation that someone who is not a Member of this House should attempt to instruct a servant of this House, the Clerk to a Specialist Committee, in this way. It was in the traditions of the servants of this House that our Clerk responded as he did. We had to hold what I can only call an informal committee meeting, which is not recorded in our Report, in the tourist compartment of a B.E.A. plane from London to Brussels. That is not the sort of way in which Specialist Committees of this House should have to conduct their affairs.
This Specialist Committee has done a valuable and useful job. It is still an experimental Committee. We have made many mistakes. I think that Government Departments have also made mistakes in their handling of the Committee. We as a Committee have to put our house in order. I hope that Government Departments will do the same when dealing with us and with other Specialist Committees in future. Specialist Committees are a powerful weapon which will retain power in this House which otherwise we may lose. Through back benchers on both sides of the House we can protect democracy in this country at a time when it may be in some danger.

8.58 p.m.

Mr. J. E. B. Hill: I endorse the criticisms and suggestions made by the hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne (Dr. John Dunwoody). I add my tribute to the work of our Chairman and our Clerk. It is an astonishing mischance or incompetence that this debate should be held in the absence of the Chairman, who was known to be committed to being a witness in a legal case. I cannot understand why matters should not have been arranged otherwise. He has been not only a competent Chairman but a valiant Chairman in dealing with some very delicate and difficult situations. It was due to his and our Clerk's skill that we avoided what could have been a fairly serious difference between a Select Committee of this House and the Executive.
Inevitably in a debate such as this one wants to concentrate on points of criticism, but first I wish to emphasise that our basic conclusion was that the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in its general assessment of a very complicated subject did a painstaking and accurate job so far as it went, which was a very long way even if in our judgment in some directions it did not go quite far enough. It was almost certainly a much more detailed and comprehensive survey and preparation than that carried out by any other Government Department in this or, indeed, in any other country.
I want to back up some of the criticisms about the non-production of the documents. Once there was an apparent variance in the evidence given to the Committee by the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Agriculture and the leader of our delegation in Brussels, the letter that was written to the Foreign Office by the leader of our delegation became best evidence. Time does not allow me to go into more criticism. I think I can best summarise it by saying that if the Foreign Office was not playing for a draw from the start, I have never seen a cricket match.
We were much concerned in our Report by the general difficulties of staffing both in the Ministry and in our delegations abroad. The argument about extra help required at Brussels must, in fairness to the Permanent Secretary and the Ambassador, be seen against the background of the scarcity of high and, indeed, medium level civil servants, the men with the requisite agricultural knowledge and experience in a most specialised field.
On 1st March the Committee inquired whence the extra staff for any negotiating team would come, and it seemed clear that in the reorganisation of Government the Ministry of Agriculture had lost some good men and was missing them, for the Permanent Secretary said at Question 115:
The other thing which would help us most would be if we could pull back quite a number of exceedingly valuable people who have left us to staff some of the new Departments like Technology, and the D.E.A. But they would have to be pulled back. These are the most valuable people; these are trained people. This is the real dilemma: of course, another pair of hands is always better than nothing, but what you really want is a pair of hands that has been broken in.


The delegation in Brussels realised the Ministry's general difficulty but pointed out to the Select Committee that it took between three and six months for a newly-posted officer, even with the requisite agricultural knowledge, to be of real use at Brussels, depending on the extent to which he was familiar with the procedures of the Common Market. This inevitable running-in period emphasises the significance of Sir James Marjoribanks's request for the additional member of his staff in October, 1966. The Ministry, in paragraph 22 of their Observations in reply to our Report, baldly stated that Sir James's delegation had coped adequately in the past, that he had said in April that he would need an extra Assistant Principal in the future and that such an officer was made available and took up his duties in Autumn 1967—a year after the first request.
But this paragraph, excluding mention of the earlier request, is, to put it politely, an over-simplification of what actually happened. Throughout the questioning of two important sessions of the delegation, in London in April and in Brussels in July, Sir James Marjoribanks rightly maintained that the delegation had been able to cope adequately with the volume of the inquiries, and the work put to them, but his evidence implied that some further activities might and even ought to have been undertaken had staff been available. The limitation was not so much as to adequacy as in the scope of the delegation's work.
At Question 603, Sir James said:
The Assistant Principal would deal mainly, I would think, with technical inquiries regarding the more detailed aspects of the Community's agricultural policy, and as a result of that he would take some of the burden of this from Mr. Ford "—
the agricultural counsellor—
and give him more time for that particular purpose, also for thinking about the future developments in the common agricultural policy, because what the Community does in agriculture is a very good, in fact the best, indication we have so far of how it really works and is likely to operate in future.
To be able to answer inquiries, gather information from the Commission and disseminate information from home was not, in the Select Committee's view, enough. We concluded that more time and effort were needed for what one might describe as creative analysis and

appreciation of present and future trends, especially in places where the common agricultural policy's shoe pinched the member countries, and time for what was aptly described to me as "think pieces". If the Government sufficiently realised this need, it was not met in time to be of value at the early critical phase, the run-up to our application.
In our journeying abroad, although the Foreign Office's procrastination did not, at the last moment, stop the flight of these five Members, it did prevent the Select Committee from looking further abroad into the member countries of the Six. It was clear to us that the agricultural policy which the United Kingdom might negotiate upon was not that proposed by the Commission but whatever was acceptable to the Six, and perhaps the greatest difference between the United Kingdom and the E.E.C. was in agricultural policy.
It was obvious to the Committee, therefore, that the quality of our agricultural representation in our embassies overseas was all-important. We were concerned at an early stage with numbers of agricultural representatives and were surprised to learn that there were only four agricultural attachés in service—in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and one jointly for the Netherland and Denmark. When the Permanent Secretary was asked—this is Question 113—where he would put another attaché abroad if he were given one, he said:
It would be a terribly difficult choice. I think I would say France.
That much specialised work needed to be done in the member countries as well as at the Commission was confirmed by Sir James Marjoribanks from his vantage point at Brussels. He was, after all, seeing what went on all round. At our meeting in Brussels, he referred to Sir John Winnifrith's statement about attachés, and continued—this is Question 1191—
In so far as these experts from the various countries of the Community are concerned, they do come to Brussels, but they are here for a relatively short time, and then they go back to their capitals. It is a continual traffic to and from the national capital to Brussels, and it is not always awfully easy for people who are not actual members of the Community to get hold of them. It is really easier for that work to be done in the national capitals where the Embassy has a real status


to go to the Ministry of Agriculture and see the people concerned.
It was clear, too, that the Commission at Brussels, under the whole structure of the Economic Community, would not be the body to decide whether the United Kingdom should be admitted to membership. The decision would come from the Six member countries operating under the club rule that one black ball excludes. Hence, it was perfectly clear that the position of France was of great significance, for a whole variety of reasons with which I shall not trouble the House. But the Select Committee as such had no opportunity to visit France.
However, the hon. Member for Merioneth (Mr. William Edwards) and I, on one of the private visits referred to, together with my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, West (Mr. Stodart), had a chance in June of going to several of the Common Market strategic points, including a visit to France to see something of French agriculture. It was certainly quite clear to me on the evidence I could get in two days, in which I was greatly helped by the British Embassy, that the case, certainly the prima facie case, was strongly in favour of having a separate agricultural attaché. I do not think that it is fair to place a heavy burden, much of it technical, on comparatively junior officers with other major responsibilities and no specialist training as agriculturists.
This is in no way intended to be any reflection upon the ability or skill of those officers who looked after us, but merely to state that they were non-specialists expected to do a specialist job. It was abundantly clear that in agriculture British and French thinking was so far apart that a major effort was required to remove various misconceptions.

Mr. Peter Mills: Does my hon. Friend agree that it is very important also that countries like France should know what is going on in this country in agriculture? It is a two-way movement of information.

Mr. Hill: We strongly believe that. It was not something the then Minister of Agriculture reckoned to be a duty of the attachés, though we put great emphasis on it.
There was a curious disparity between the numbers of Ministry of Agriculture officers visiting Brussels and Paris. The figures are given in the evidence. In the two years January, 1965 to 1967 visits of Ministry of Agriculture officials to Brussels amounted to only 28/29 man-days, of which 10 to 11 excluded the purely technical experts. The figures supplied at a very late moment by the Foreign Office of visits to Paris show, in appendix 27, the astonishing difference, in admittedly 2½ years. There was a total of 856 man-days, of which at least 86 were of key officials from the External Relations and the Economic Policy divisions. The Foreign Office might say that this immense journeying of officials obviated the need for an agricultural attaché. But to me it stresses the need.
Much of this is water under the bridge. But even under the veto the agricultural problem remains. Its treatment needs continuing study, even if at reduced pressure, since, whether we are in or out of the European Economic Community, the common agricultural policy, especially as implemented in France, can have a marked influence on our markets and prices. In this connection, it gives me a certain wry satisfaction that the new British Ambassador-designate in Paris, whatever the Foreign Office has said about the need for more agricultural expertise, is the last Conservative Minister of Agriculture. I am content to leave this matter to Mr. Christopher Soames's further investigation and judgment as the man on the spot in command.
The whole of this debate is akin to a post-mortem examination. The Committee has had some modest success. Ministers and civil servants have given evidence in public without disaster or even noticeable inconvenience. I take the point that it was very difficult for them to avoid moving over in public on to what might have been the ground of negotiations. But that still leaves us in doubt as to whether the Ministry, in fact, had all the appreciations about possibilities to which we refer.
Secondly, the evidence contains a mass of valuable information and I should not like the officials to think that these memoranda will be put aside for all time. Anyone getting our volume of evidence and using the splendid index can find a


mass of useful information. The Committee has also thrown some light on various matters of public interest and, as the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh) pointed out, we have assisted in setting out the guide lines on which Select Committees may travel in future.
Originally, I was sceptical about the usefulness of these Committees, but I have come to believe that there is value in a long, continuing look by a few—and I stress, a few—hon. Members specialising in one subject over a period and I do not think that it is possible to keep the inquiry and report necessarily within the confines of a single Session. I hope that the House, in taking note of the Report, will conclude that, as long as there is important subject matter before it, a Select Committee should continue to complete its chosen course in its own time.

9.16 p.m.

Mr. Derek Page: It was suggested earlier that the right hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Godber) would never be on the Government Front Bench again. I am not so sure. He has proved himself honourable and knowledgable, and his joining the Labour Party is, I think, only a matter of time. Be that as it may, I am glad to have been able to play a part in the pioneering work of the Select Committee.
I congratulate the Government on their great courage in instituting the Committee. Having instituted it, they found themselves in the position of a man who takes his dog for a walk, but finds that the dog takes him instead for a fast gallop. But all credit is due to the Government, and the fact that the Committee has been continued and its Report widely welcomed is genuinely a reflection of credit on the Government themselves. I hope that the rumours we have heard of an early winding up of the Committee are false and that it will be allowed to continue its work.
Agriculture is the most important industry in the country. I found that hon. Members, as they continued their work in the Committee, tended to become more skilled in the art of questioning and probing. Hon. Members, after one or two sittings of the Committee, are vastly more valuable at the finish than at the start of their service.
I add my congratulations to the Chairman of the Committee. He stood up for the rights of hon. Members in a way which showed that he has real guts. A lesser man would have caved in many a time. In time to come, the stand he took for the rights of members of Select Committees will be looked upon as a classic example of determination. I am very sorry indeed that he is not able to be with us tonight.
Hon. Members have dealt at great length with procedural issues, which are of great importance, and I add my voice to those who have condemned the procrastination and obstruction of the Foreign Office. This has been proved beyond doubt. But it would be a mistake to concentrate too long on the details, which are plain to any open mind. The big question is why the Foreign Office was obstructive and why it procrastinated. This demands an answer. In my opinion, its obstruction was because, in this sector, above all, the matters concerning the Common Market, the balance was completely against entry. Because it had already been decided to apply to join the Common Market, certain powers within the Government were determined to do all they could to sabotage the examination of this sector, and it is greatly to the credit of the Committee that it insisted on going ahead with its examination.
Certain points flow from the substance of the Report. First, I ask hon. Members to bear in mind the plain statement of the Ministry of Agriculture and the N.F.U. that the Broad outline of the E.E.C. common agricultural policy is fixed. That was the opinion of every expert who appeared before us. It does not need repeating that the Committee found that the Ministry had done its job and that its opinions were therefore reliable. There is rock solid evidence that the broad lines are fixed, which means that it is impossible for the Government to keep their pledge in the election manifesto not to go over to the system of levies on imported food and at the same time to enter the Common Market.
Secondly, we have had considerable discussion about procedural matters and some mention of the effect on agriculture, but careful consideration should also be given to the part of the Report which deals with the effect on consumer demand.
Thirdly, it is clear from the figures which we were given of the relative performances of British and Continental agriculture that the British system has proved itself infinitely superior. I wonder whether the Board of Trade and the Foreign Office have considered the fact that the 2 per cent. difference in British agriculture's increase in productivity is equivalent to a cumulative sum of £40 million a year on the balance of payments. Can we lightly throw away this tremendous advantage which we have built up by our system of agriculture? I do not believe that it has yet been taken into account at all.
Lastly, remembering the tremendously impressive weight of evidence in the Report, it would be madness for any Government at this juncture not to investigate carefully and in much greater depth the Common Market trading arrangements which exclude free trade in agriculture, and particularly the implications of the international industrial free trade area, or, possibly, the North Atlantic free trade arrangements which are currently attracting increased interest throughout the country.
I hope that the information in the Report will be of value in assessing the value of possible entry into the Common Market, and the disadvantages, and also in showing the deep probing investigation necessary in every sector of the economy in considering whether the Rome Treaty type of organisation, or some more liberal and widespread organisation, would be to our advantage.

9.24 p.m.

Mr. Alick Buchanan-Smith: The hon. Member for King's Lynn (Mr. Derek Page) began his speech by likening the work of the Committee to a man taking his dog for a walk and ending with the dog taking him for a walk. I have a rather different simile. It is that this Committee was an egg laid by the then Leader of the House and the then Minister of Agriculture who found that it hatched not the bird they expected, but a cuckoo. Certainly it has been something of an embarrassment to the Government Front Bench and to the Opposition Front Bench, to judge from the concluding words of my right hon. Friend the Member for Grantham (Mr. Godber). Back benchers

have been able to produce something of value, a reform which is a milestone on the journey towards making the House more respected in the country.
One of the factors which have made
a success of this venture has been the tremendous breadth of agreement between Members on both sides of the House. I have found this one of the most satisfying features of the work—the way in which the different parties have worked together as Members of the House, rather than as Members of particular parties. It is to the credit of the Committee that at no time during its deliberations last year was a vote ever taken. I know that there were times when some of us disagreed with some of the decisions, but on every occasion the minority bowed to the majority without forcing a Division. This is a most significant factor for the future, and I hope that it will be carried forward
by our Committee and others. It has raised respect outside the House for our work and for us as Members.
Speaking personally, the other advantage is that it has given those who sat on the Committee a much greater respect for the civil servant members of the Department whom we were examining. It has brought us into contact with them, and we have got to know them as personalities and people. This contact with the work we are doing helps us to understand the problems which are faced by people who carry out the policies which we decide upon. Speaking as a back bencher, it has certainly given me a much greater appreciation of what the work of a civil servant entails.
The Committee's greatest value has been the assessment of the Common Market, carried out in detail by the Ministry of Agriculture, which would never have been carried out but for the existence of this Committee. The agricultural community at large, and consumers too, owe a great deal to the Committee for having managed to wring this assessment from the Ministry. Its value to the industry is undoubted, and there is value for us in the House, because the Department and the Minister have had to justify their actions and policies far more closely than they would have had to do by debate or Question and Answer.
It has given us a greater opportunity to check up, to keep a watch on the


activities of the Minister than we have ever had before. To that extent it has made the work of the back benchers, and their power, much more real than previously. I found it much more satisfying than just sitting through a debate, sometimes being able to contribute, or being able to ask a very small supplementary to a Question. The Committee has given far more scope to back benchers to do proper work in influencing policy than anything else. A third advantage is that it has given back benchers access to information, statistics and other material which until now has only been available to the Minister and his Under-Secretaries. This is very important, because until now, when decisions have been brought to the House by a Minister, as back benchers we have had to accept them at their face value. We have been able to check them against information provided by outside organisations such as the N.F.U., but for the first time we have been able to look at the decisions taken by Ministers in the light of the same information provided to them. Therefore, it has given us much more scope and opportunity to judge the Minister's decisions and to discover whether the information on which decisions were made was wrong. This gives back bench Members much more control over the formation of policy and makes us much more informed when judging these decisions.
In general, these are the benefits of a Select Committee of this sort. I have found them of great use during the time that I have served on the Committee.
I do not intend to deal in detail with the procedural questions because they have been dealt with already particularly by the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh). In this Committee, we stood by our principles. At no stage in our deliberations did we allow ourselves to be dictated to by Ministers. This has cleared the way and set definite principles which I hope will guide other Committees.
I should like to know whether the Government have found our Report embarrassing. I have been given that impression. Do the Government want these Committees to work? If they do, and in the light of our Report, why was there such a delay in re-establishing the Committee to do its work this year? The Committee

drew attention to the delay in establishing it last year. Secondly, why has not the question of staffing these Committees been fully resolved? Like others, I pay tribute to the quality of staff which we had last year, but we need much more expert advice and help.
Why has the size of the Committee been enlarged? Small committees get things done much more quickly and effectively. Last year, because the Committee was small, we found that we shared the work better. We realised that we all had to work. If the Committee gets bigger, there will be a temptation to think that somebody else will do the work. A committee is much stronger and more effective if it is small; people feel their responsibilities more. Last year, the average attendance was 12, which, in a committee of 16, is a high proportion. From my observations of what has happened in the Committee so far, we shall not attain that average this year. By enlarging the Committee, the Government run the danger of weakening it and making its work less effective.
I turn to the detailed assessment of the Common Market which the Ministry made. As was said in the Report, I do not think that its assessment was flexible enough. I hope that this point will be taken into account when we approach the Common Market next time and that a much more flexible approach will be adopted. Secondly, on the question of our representation in foreign capitals, it is most important that this should be watched as a continuing matter, particularly in relation to dumping and other problems which we face.
I turn to the relationship of the Committee to the Department of Agriculture for Scotland. It is anomalous that the Committee should deal with agricultural policy but be unable to deal with Scottish questions, many of which are identical to those which arise in England. If the Committee's work is to be more effective on a national basis, its remit should be extended to Scotland.

9.35 p.m.

Mr. Anthony Stodart: I should like to join in the compliments which have been paid to the members of the Committee and to its Chairman and to express my regret that he has been unable to be present tonight.
It is perfectly clear that circumstances have weighed heavily against the Committee. My right hon. Friend the Member for Grantham (Mr. Godber) referred to the time that was made available to it and to its staffing difficulties. These points have virtually dominated the debate.
The hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh) followed my right hon. Friend on these points. His speech was very much in line with many others which we have heard from him. He spoke of the Government's failure to react to the pressure which he said that the Government had urged the Committee to exert upon the Government. I feel that he misses something by being unable to see the expressions on the faces of Members of his Front Bench as his barbs of criticism of them grow ever sharper and more penetrating. Indeed, the Minister of State, Foreign Office, looked rather more like a professional mute at the funeral of the Committee than one who was supposed to be welcoming the Report that it had made.
When I heard the hon. Gentleman talk about the shortage of time and the prospect of possibly having to sit in the Summer Recess, it recalled to me the famous line that I declaimed once when I played the Fairy Queen in Iolanthe, when she imperiously said to Private Willis:
You shall sit, if we see reason,
Through the grouse and salmon season.
The task given to the Select Committee was to investigate the activities in England and Wales of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. Looking at it I find it rather extraordinary description of the duties imposed on it, designed almost to put the Scots off the scent, because the only activities of the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food outside England and Wales lie in animal health: for instance, the control of foot-and-mouth disease in Scotland. Therefore, it looked as though hon. Gentlemen from Scotland were not going to be asked to spend time on what looked like an investigation of Departmental operations within the Ministry of Agriculture.
But the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian clearly knew more about the workings of the mind of the Lord

President of the Council, because I think it is fair to say he smelled a rat in this direction. It is quite clear that if the Committee were to inquire into things like the European Economic Community and matters of import-saving potential, hon. Gentlemen from Scotland should be in on it. It is fair to say that they have been extremely useful members of the Committee.
I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Rye (Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine), and I agree with the hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne (Dr. John Dunwoody) and my hon. Friend the Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Buchanan-Smith) that the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for Scotland should have been included. The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland knows of the close contacts which are kept with the Ministry. He also knows of the problems which face Scottish agriculture. The Department of Agriculture is very much more knowledgeable—and I claim no particular credit for this other than the geographic circumstances of Scotland—about the hill areas and their problems than the Ministry of England, and it could probably have given the Committee some very good advice. I hope that when the future of the Committee is mapped out the Department will be included within its sphere of operations.
The Minister spoke of the importance of the work done by the Committee, and I agree with him, but much of the Report has been overshadowed by discussions of a procedural nature. I think that for a considerable time the Report will be of use to those who study and do research into agriculture, provided—and this is perhaps a criticism which I have of nearly all reports of this kind—that someone can find what he is looking for.
The Report is quite well indexed, but I often feel that I have to go by memory, and that when I have to look up something the index shows everything but the reference that I want. The Report will be like another document which I have found invaluable, and that is the report of the great conference on agriculture held by I.C.I. about 12 or 13 years ago. It contains a mass of information which is of constant value to me.
For most of us much of the subject matter of the Report has been forced


into the further recesses of our minds by the pressure of recent events, and it has been very useful, to me at any rate, to read and re-read the Report and to realise how much and how quickly what we knew about the E.E.C. and its conditions had departed from our minds.
I am certain that the Committee was right in its comments about the staffing position in Brussels. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, South (Mr. J. E. B. Hill) that we are short of agricultural representation in Paris, and I am sure that our position there should be strengthened. I hope that the Minister will comment on the Ministry's Observations in paragraph 22 on page 6, where it says:
Sir James also said that he did not think the representation on the agricultural side would be adequate in the future, and that he was therefore anxious to acquire the services of an Assistant Principal. The Department offered in April to make an Assistant Principal available; an officer was selected and has now taken up his duties in Brussels.
When did he take up those duties?
I would have found it intriguing, to say the least, to be told of the Committee's views on a number of points. After all, it consisted of an extremely talented body of people with knowledgeable agriculturists among them. I agree with the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian that it was not their job to argue among themselves whether we ought to go into Europe. On the other hand, there is the point about the possible effect of higher cereal prices. The N.F.U. in its evidence thought that the extra acres needed to grow cereals would come from grass, and that the balance of the agriculture industry might be badly upset. The Ministry, in its submissions, thought that, if cattle and sheep breeders were edged out of the low ground, hill farmers would benefit because they would supply most of the stock needed to fill the reservoir. There is a conflict there and I should have been intrigued to know what the Members of the Committee thought on that matter and one or two others.
This Report will be of great value to those interested in agriculture and I sincerely compliment those who worked so hard to produce it

9.45 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. James Hoy): We have had a most interesting debate. I start with a great deal of sympathy for those who serve on Committees. I realise the limitations of Committees because I have served on the Public Accounts Committee for, I think, longer than any other hon. Member, without a break. I know that such work involves a good deal of reading. If one is to play a sensible part in any Committee one has to read the papers with which the Committee must deal. I found this onerous even on the Public Accounts Committee, but I found the work so interesting that I stuck at it for 16 or 17 years and I hope that hon. Members may stay on this Committee as long, particularly if they offer a party political opinion which I would support.
The right hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Godber) was a little unkind in his reference to the consultations before this debate was held. He did not ask us, or I would have been delighted to tell him that the Chairman of the Select Committee was consulted and wrote to my right hon. Friend the present Lord Privy Seal on the 10th of this month to say:
May I thank you for your kindness in allowing a debate on last Session's Specialist Committee on Agriculture.
It happens that on the same day I have to give evidence at the T.U.C.C. hearing at Llandrindod Wells to consider objections to the closure of the Central Wales line.
I want to do so as M.P., as well as chairman of the Co-ordinating Committee of all the local authorities.
The Select Committee agreed on Wednesday that Mr. John Mackintosh should chair next week's session and I have asked him to speak to the Report in my stead.
Kind regards,
I hope that that clears up the matter. If the right hon. Gentleman had asked me, I should have been delighted to give him the information in private rather than in public.
There has been reference to the great increase in the number of members on the Committee from 16 to 25. To get the matter in order, we should pay some token of tribute to the Lord President of the Council. This was an innovation which no other Government had attempted. It was something completely


new to the House of Commons. When the Committee was set up, it was to inquire into the Agricultural Department of England and Wales. That was its specific function. As a result of a year's work, it may be thought that it needs to be extended, but there was immediately a protest by my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh).
He and my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) wanted to serve on the Committee. They were not on the Committee in the beginning because the Committee was designed specifically to deal with England and Wales. Eventually the number was increased from 14 to 16. My hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland used extravagant language about people being coerced and dragooned onto the Committee.

Mr. Robert Maclennan: That is what they said.

Mr. Hoy: Whatever they said, I am referring to what my hon. Friend said and I assure him that it was sheer nonsense. [Interruption.] I am giving my side of the story. This is my understanding of the position. It is that they wanted the Committee enlarged, and this is the best information I have. Indeed, we enlarged it because certain hon. Members representing horticultural areas wanted to be represented on the Committee.
The Committee has been subdivided into Sub-Committees dealing with horticulture, fisheries and, of course, the general Committee on agriculture. It has, therefore, been divided into three sections, which I regard as a sensible way of working. But, it was not at the request of the Government that the Committee was enlarged, and the Government did not want to coerce hon. Members on to it. The Government acted at the request of hon. Members who wanted to be on it.

Mr. Buchanan-Smith: Was the Chairman or other members of the Committee consulted?

Mr. Hoy: I cannot say offhand who was consulted. My argument is that hon. Members like my hon. Friends—and they had every reason to make this request—said that the Committee should be en-

larged, and action was taken to meet their request. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] It is no good hon. Gentlemen opposite dissenting. These are the facts.

Mr. Maclennan: The initial objection to the absence of a Scottish hon. Member on the Committee arose because it was felt that the point which my hon. Friend is making should not go unchallenged; the point that the Committee was designed to deal with one or two parts of England and hon. Members of the United Kingdom Parliament felt that, whatever regions they represented, they had every right to participate in the Committee's deliberations. This was not an argument for expanding the Committee but of membership of it being open to all hon. Members.

Mr. Hoy: I am not demurring from that. I am recounting how the enlargement came about. I have always argued that any hon. Member elected to Parliament should have the right to serve on any Committee, without consideration of nationality. I was hoping that by giving this explanation hon. Members would appreciate that there was no plot by the Government to keep hon. Members off the Committee; and it becomes a little hard to take when my hon. Friend tries to convince me that we were trying to force hon. Members onto it.

Mr. William Baxter: rose—

Mr. Hoy: I will not give way. I have only a few minutes in which to answer the many questions that have been asked. You made an appeal for hon. Members to curtail their speeches, Mr. Speaker, so that many hon. Members could speak. My hon. Friend the Member for Berwick and East Lothian spoke for 35 minutes and little time remains for my reply.
I was asked when the Assistant Principal took up his duties in Brussels. In fact, he took them up on 18th November of last year. It was suggested that some of the papers supplied by the Ministry arrived late. We supplied 33 papers to the Committee and five of them were rather late in arriving. I will come to that. The suggestion was made that information was forced out of the
Department by the Committee. The Committee did nothing of the kind.
We regret that the papers were late, but at that time my Department was studying intensively what requirements there should be in any negotiations for entry into Europe. The Ministry of Agriculture had a double task in turning up the facts and figures on what entry into Europe might mean and, at the same time, providing papers for the Select Committee. If papers were delayed, they were delayed for this reason. The Committee should not lose its sense of balance about it, since out of 33 papers 28 were well up to time.
Some papers dealt with relatively peripheral subjects, and in one case at least the paper was delayed, as the Committee knew, only so as to take into account developments in the Community at that time. Until those developments were known my Department could not supply the paper. I hope that we shall be acquitted of any intention to hold up valuable information.
I was grateful to the hon. Member for Norfolk, South (Mr. J. E. B. Hill) who made some kindly remarks about the Department. He is the only hon. Member I can think of who had anything to say about the agricultural content of the Report until We heard from the hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Buchanan-Smith) and the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West (Mr. Stodart).
I will just say a word or two about the flight of the five members of the Committee, which apparently was the main topic of the afternoon. It is true that there was some delay in dealing with the application for sending the members to Brussels. The application was one of many. I do not need to go over it all from the beginning until the telephone call that was so aptly reported by my hon. Friend. The telephone call from Lord Chalfont to Heathrow Airport was of outstanding importance. It may now seem funny, but it did not help the work of the Committee.
We hope that in future such things will be smoothed out. The House will remember that this is the first Committee of this kind that has been appointed, and it is the first experience we have had of the working of such a Committee. Obviously, certain mistakes did occur, and certain weaknesses were revealed in the working of the Committee. I hope that we shall correct these mistakes in the days that lie ahead. The hon. Gentleman asked to be assured that the Committee would be kept going. I cannot give a specific answer tonight, any more than my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick and East Lothian could extract an answer from the right hon. Member for Grantham as to how he looked at Committees of this kind. He said that he was not altogether convinced of their usefulness, and wondered whether they were worth the cost. He said that as an innovation it was paying dividends. I was grateful to the hon. Gentleman for saying that.
The hon. Member for Norfolk, South said that if the Committee had done no more, it had provided him with dossiers on agriculture that would otherwise never have come into his possession. We shall pay attention to what has been said in the debate and, as a result of one year's experience, we hope to be more perfect in the work of the Committee in the days that lie ahead.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House takes note of the Report from the Select Committee on Agriculture in the last Session of Parliament, and of the Departmental Observations thereon (Command Paper No. 3479).

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Ordered,
That the Proceedings on the Motions relating to Members (Travelling Expenses) and House of Commons (Services) and on the Water Resources Bill may be entered upon and proceeded with at this day's Sitting at any hour, though opposed.—[Mr. Armstrong.]

MEMBERS (TRAVELLING EXPENSES)

Mr. Speaker: I have not selected the Amendment to the next Motion formally, but it can be discussed with the Motion and, if the hon. Member for Dumfries (Mr. Monro) wishes, I am prepared to allow a Division on it.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That, in the opinion of this House, the facilities available to a Member for free travel on parliamentary duties between London and his constituency by any public railway, sea or air service should be extended to cover travel by chartered air services, provided that the cost to public funds is no greater than the cost of travel by public transport.—[Mr. Peart.]

10.1 p.m.

Mr. Hector Monro: I am very glad to have the chance to speak to the Motion, even if I am not able to move my Amendment which proposes the insertion of the words "or private aeroplane" after the word "services". However, I hope that the Leader of the House will accept it in principle, at least.
It is important that the Motion has been put down, because we must move with the times and use the opportunity of the most advanced form of transport whenever it is available. It will help hon. Members to reach their constituencies and the House more quickly and, more important, it may help hon. Members who live away from their constituencies where cross-country journeys are involved.
I shall be interested to hear from the right hon. Gentleman why he has put down a Motion confined to chartered air services, and I shall be equally interested to hear his views about my proposal to include private aeroplanes. There are very few private pilots in the House; in fact, 66 per cent. of them are present, and I hope that the third will be with us soon. None of them owns his own aircraft, though I am sure that they would take the opportunity to use club aircraft or borrow aircraft owned by friends if they were able to reimburse part of the cost with the aid of the normal expense allowance given to hon. Members travelling to their constituencies.
I hope that, in the future, more hon. Members will be sufficiently interested in flying to have their own licences. If my Amendment were accepted, they would be able to reach their constituencies more

quickly and, more important, it would enable more hon. Members to know what is going on in the world of air transport, because it is only by practical participation that one understands the difficulties which face light aircraft and executive aircraft pilots who wish to fly over this country.
I must stress that I am not asking for more generous treatment than that which is afforded to hon. Members who travel by road or rail. We do not expect anything more than the first-class rail fare which can be set against the costs of flying an aeroplane.
Perhaps I might give the right hon. Gentleman two brief examples to show that there is no question of hon. Members making a profit out of it. I have chosen two rather distant towns. The first of them, Plymouth, is 225 miles from London. The rail fare is 91s., and the journey takes about four hours. The same mileage by air would require about 16 gallons of petrol, which cost £5, and one could do the journey in about two hours. In addition, if one had to hire an aeroplane, it might cost £15. There is no question of the air fare being cheaper than the rail fare. Therefore, the hon. Member would be out of pocket. I mentioned four hours by rail, but hon. Members from the West Country know that in summer it would take many more hours by road.
For my second example I chose the town of Carlisle because I know that the Leader of the House takes an interest in Carlisle Airport, where I often fly. It is 300 miles away and the first-class rail fare is 119s. It would certainly cost £6 for petrol for a light aeroplane to fly from here and £18 or £19 if one hired a club aircraft for the journey. There is no question but that an hon. Member would be out of pocket by using light aircraft for that journey.
We should encourage hon. Members to use light aircraft, whether their own or those borrowed from clubs or friends. In this way we could stimulate interest in air travel for the light aircraft and executive aircraft, which is as important as giving hon. Members the opportunity to use charter aircraft.

10.6 p.m.

Mr. Frank Taylor: I am glad that the Leader of the House proposes to bring charter aircraft


into the advantage of hon. Members' assisted travelling expenses. This shows that he appreciates that there are other means of air transport than the public service aeroplane. So far so good, but the proposed extension to charter air services only is unfair since it expressly excludes private hire.
My hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries (Mr. Monro) has spoken of the number of hon. Members who have a pilot's licence. They naturally feel slighted by the terms of this Motion, since those who are in a position to fly their own aero-planes are completely excluded from the benefits of the Motion. They feel slighted because the Motion is couched in terms which slow that the Government have little regard for light aircraft and they wonder why light aircraft are expressly excluded. This is either due to the thoughtlessness of those who drafted the Motion or it hints that private aircraft are of little consequence and that the Government do not need to bother about them.
The light aircraft industry has dwindled and very few now have a light aircraft in operation. We should do everything we can to sponsor and help them. One or two hon. Members were at Hanover a week ago at an aircraft fair. The place was flooded with light aircraft from all over the world, but there were only two there from England. If this Motion could be extended to include private aircraft it would show that the Government recognise that light aircraft have a place in the country and deserve support. The industry is struggling because in other countries there are subsidies for construction and purchase and also for fuel. In England, we suffer through lack of that.
If the right hon. Gentleman agreed to add light aircraft to the Motion it would satisfy we who feel so strongly on this matter. I confess to being one of the hon. Members who has a pilot's licence, one of the very few. We hope that the Minister will agree to add private aircraft.

10.10 p.m.

The Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Fred Peart): I am sorry that the hon. Member for Manchester, Moss Side (Mr. Frank Taylor) showed a slight political undertone in his speech. There is no conflict here. The Government are

as anxious as the Opposition to encourage the light aircraft industry, so I hope that that idea will not remain in the hon. Member's mind as that I am judging this Motion on its merits, and also the Amendment which is in the name of the hon. Member. I believe in the light aircraft industry and will do anything I can to encourage it.
However, we are really dealing here with a matter which involves Members and expenses. I would remind the House very quickly that on 15th November, 1945 the House passed a Resolution—it is a long time ago now—authorising free travel for Members to their constituencies on any public railway, sea or air service. Therefore, in the course of that, travel vouchers cannot be provided to cover the use of chartered air transport, nor can such expenditure, incurred by a Member, be refunded.
A few instances have occurred recently in which a scheduled flight has not been able to be completed owing to bad weather, although chartered flights in smaller aircraft have been possible. A Member who may have an important engagement in his constituency is then forced to join a chartered aircraft at his own expense and cannot claim the cost or even a refund of the cost of that part of the scheduled flight which has not been completed.
This Motion proposes that a Member may receive from the Fees Office money which can be reclaimed from the air company concerned. Any extra cost of the chartered flight will have to be paid by the Member. This will result in no extra cost to public funds but will help to compensate the Member for the extra expense to which he has been put through no fault of his own.
I have noted what has been said by the two hon. Gentlemen opposite and I agree with the hon. Member for Dumfries that there is a problem here. I know this from my own experience. I have a constituency which is just south of Carlisle: it is probably the most remote, in many ways, of any part of England. I have to travel to Carlisle and down to the coast and I would like to improve the air service between Cumberland and the City here. I think the hon. Member who has used Carlisle as an airport would agree with me.
So there is no dispute. I hope the hon. Member will give me the Motion, which I think is agreed. I will take note of what he has said. I will consider carefully the wording of his Amendment. In principle, I accept it. I will give it all the sympathy which I know is essential in a matter which will help hon. Members and will encourage aviation, as both hon. Members opposite want.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That, in the opinion of this House, the facilities available to a Member for free travel on parliamentary duties between London and his constituency by any public railway, sea or air service should be extended to cover travel by chartered air services, provided that the cost to public funds is no greater than the cost of travel by public transport.

HOUSE OF COMMONS (SERVICES)

Fifth Report of the Select Committee on House of Commons (Services) to be considered forthwith.—[Mr. Peart.]

Considered accordingly.

Resolved,
That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Report.—[Mr. Peart.]

WATER RESOURCES BILL

Order for Third Reading read.

Motion made, and Question, That the Bill be now read the Third time, put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 55 (Third Reading), and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed.

LOUGHBOROUGH GENERAL HOSPITAL (CASUALTY SERVICES)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Armstrong.]

10.15 p.m.

Mr. John Cronin: I have taken this opportunity to draw the attention of the House to the gross dissatisfaction which is felt by my constituents in Loughborough and the surrounding area about the casualty services provided by the Loughborough General Hospital, and to refer also to the tragic death of a small boy, Nigel Haywood, who was unable to avail himself of appropriate casualty services.
I shall draw upon a recent Report by the Gillespie Committee, with which the Parliamentary Secretary must be very familiar. I have written many letters to the Minister about casualty services at Loughborough General Hospital. I also put into his hands a petition signed by about 15,000 of the inhabitants of Loughborough, which is some indication of the strong local feeling.
The Loughborough General Hospital has been in existence for over 100 years, and there was general satisfaction with the casualty services until about 1965. At about that time, owing to various retirements, there was a breakdown of the casualty services there. It was then decided that emergencies requiring major surgery and seriously ill people should be sent directly to the Leicester Royal Infirmary. I have no quarrel with that at all, although it was a matter of some controversy at the time.
The real difficulty which has caused the strong local feeling has centred upon treatment of two categories of casualties, the first being people who have minor ailments or minor injuries—one can call them minor casualties—and the second being people who are seriously ill or seriously injured and who have been brought to Loughborough General Hospital fortuitously or through a lack of knowledge of the arrangements for taking them straight to Leicester.
The arrangements for these two categories of casualties have been grossly

unsatisfactory, are grossly unsatisfactory and will continue to be grossly unsatisfactory unless something is done to improve the situation. The Leicester No. 1 Hospital Management Committee, which is responsible for Loughborough General Hospital, made arrangements for general practitioners to provide a casualty service between the hours of 9 to 5 on weekdays and also on Saturday mornings. The Sheffield Regional Hospital Board suggested to the Leicester Hospital Management Committee in the summer of last year that minor casualties which would normally have gone to the Loughborough General Hospital should be referred by the hospital to their own doctors and that the hospital doctors at Loughborough General Hospital should treat only those who were not registered with a doctor in Loughborough or who were seriously ill or injured and had been brought to the hospital through misunderstanding or lack of knowledge that they should have been taken straight to the Leicester Royal Infirmary.
The Leicester Hospital Management Committee agreed to implement the board's wish on or about 7th July, 1967, according to the Gillespie Committee's Report, with which the Minister is familiar. I suggest that even those arrangements which the
Regional Hospital Board recommended were inadequate. It seems most unsatisfactory that a person who has a minor injury or a minor ailment should be referred to his private doctor. Except during surgery hours, the vast majority of general practitioners are on their rounds seeing patients in their homes. Therefore, this suggestion seems an inadequate one. But even the limited and, to my mind, unsatisfactory proposals of the Sheffield Regional Hospital Board were not implemented by the Leicester No. 1 Hospital Management Committee, although it had apparently accepted the Regional Board's recommendation and agreed to implement it. One sees from the Report of the Gillespie Committee that there appears to be some reluctance on the part of the medical staff of the Loughborough General Hospital to co-operate in treating casualty patients. On page 11 it is stated:
Nevertheless, we had evidence from two of the hospital porters that it was extremely difficult to obtain any help in dealing with casualties from the house officers.


The Report later states:
The present hospital secretary and his predecessor were aware of the difficulties in obtaining the concurrence of the medical staff in the carrying out of casualty duties when the department was closed, and the group secretary states he also was aware of them.
So the picture one has is that the Leicester No. 1 Hospital Management Committee has undertaken to provide a limited and still unsatisfactory casualty service but has difficulty in obtaining co-operation from the medical staff in putting this into practice. There may well be good reasons, but none of them appears in the Gillespie Report. It seems to me rather an anarchic situation when a hospital management committee recommends that certain casualty services should be provided but they cannot be provided because there is difficulty in obtaining the help of the medical staff.
The situation was brought to a head on 23rd September last year when an 18-month old child, Nigel Haywood, was brought by his mother to the Loughborough General Hospital desperately ill, having accidentally taken a poison, oil of winter-green. The incident occurred a few yards away from the hospital at 1 p.m. on a Saturday. It was obviously desperately urgent to get the poison from the child's stomach by a stomach wash, and this could have been done by any
trained nurse. The hospital had many nurses, and presumably also had resident doctors available, but the child was given no treatment there. He was simply referred by a porter to his own doctor, who had him removed by ambulance to the Leicester Royal Infirmary. As a result, there was considerable delay in treatment, and the child died next day.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Mr. Julian Snow): Is my hon. Friend saying that the doctor in question did not want to treat the child?

Mr. Cronin: No. I think that my hon. Friend misunderstands me. There is no question of the general practitioner's not wishing to treat the child. He took the sensible course of sending the child straight to the Leicester Royal Infirmary after the refusal of treatment at Loughborough. I do not intend to comment on the child's treatment at Leicester, but

I do feel that it is gross inhumanity when a desperately ill child is taken to a general hospital containing many nurses and, presumably, medical staff and it is turned aside without treatment. Admittedly, the child was referred to his doctor and ultimately to another hospital.
It is probable on the evidence that Nigel would have died in any event, but I think that he was deprived of a good chance of survival by the failure of the Leicester No. 1 Hospital Management Committee to insist on its medical staff providing a proper casualty service. I shall not pursue that point further, but I suggest to my hon. Friend that this is just one tragic example of where it is obviously necessary that there should have been a 24-hour casualty service at the Loughborough General Hospital. I have heard that since then another child has been taken to the hospital, having drunk a large quantity of alcohol. On this occasion, efficient treatment was instituted by one of the nurses. The child's stomach was washed out and it survived. But I would not wish to continue now to dwell on individual cases. The important thing to point out is that Loughborough as a town and its surrounding area is entitled to a 24-hour casualty service.
Population of Loughborough is 40,000. The General Hospital has a catchment area of over 100,000 persons. I believe that the staffing ratio at the hospital is quite favourable for the provision of adequate casualty services. There are three resident doctors for about 60 occupied beds. I cannot understand, in these circumstances, why a 24-hour casualty service cannot be provided, bearing in mind that there are also general practitioners who work in the casualty service between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays and on Saturday mornings. This is not putting too much of a strain on the medical staff.
It may well be that there are occasions when there is a grave lack of medical staff at the hospital, but I understand that this is not normally the case. Usually, there are three resident doctors who only look after 60 beds, and I would not have thought it impossible for them to provide some sort of casualty service for the population of Loughborough and the large catchment area around it when


the general practitioners who are engaged for the purposes of a casualty service during the presented hours are off duty.
We must bear in mind also that Loughborough is a university town, with a large number of sporting and recreational activities and that numerous injuries result. We should also bear in mind that Loughborough has many industries and that there are numerous minor industrial injuries. Yet the fact remains that a worker who cuts a finger and needs it stitched has to go to Leicester for such elementary treatment, if he is so unfortunate as to have his injury out of the normal casualty hours at the General Hospital. I would have thought that, from the point of view of maintaining productivity alone, it would be desirable for an industrial town like Loughborough to have a 24-hour casualty service.
I hope that my hon. Friend is not going to give a final reply tonight. This matter should be studied and I feel sure that, when it has been thoroughly investigated, the balance of opinion will be strongly in favour of Loughborough having a 24-hour casualty service.
Loughborough has had a 24-hour casualty service for over 100 years, and it is difficult to understand why this service should cease about 1965. It must mean either that Loughborough is being discriminated against by the hon. Gentleman's Ministry, or else there has been a general deterioration of casualty services in all hospitals, or the majority of them. This is an inescapable conclusion. Both, or either, of those circumstances seems discreditable to the Ministry of Health. I hope that my hon. Friend will look at this matter carefully. I do not expect him to give a full and complete answer tonight, but I hope that he and the Minister will look at this and put an end to the justifiably strong feeling of discontent in the town of Loughborough about its casualty service—this feeling that it is not getting fair treatment from the National Health Service.

10.30 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Mr. Julian Snow): My hon Friend the Member for Loughborough (Mr. Cronin) has raised tonight a distressing constituency case which has

already been the subject of exhaustive inquiry by a specially constituted committee of inquiry. The inquiry referred to is the Gillespie Report. That report was published last month under a statement by the Sheffield Regional Hospital Board, of which I sent my hon. Friend a copy in advance of this debate. My hon. Friend asked whether he might also have a copy of the transcript of evidence given to the Committee. I must tell him that the Committee sat in private and that I am not at liberty to disclose the evidence to him. I would however assure him that the transcript of evidence is available in confidence to members of the Sheffield Regional Hospital Board, including a gentleman well known to my hon. Friend. I would also emphasise that the members of the committee of inquiry—a solicitor, a hospital matron and a consultant paediatrician—were quite independent of the area concerned.
The report is about the case of a 17-month-old child, Nigel Haywood, who shortly after mid-day on Saturday, 23rd September last, drank a quantity of oil of wintergreen in Loughborough. His mother took him to the local hospital, Loughborough General Hospital, where she found that the casualty department was closed for the weekend. A porter telephoned the family doctor who, through his wife, advised that the child be taken by ambulance to Leicester Royal Infirmary. This was done without delay. The child was admitted there but eventually died.
The committee of inquiry raised a number of points about what happened after the child was admitted to Leicester Royal Infirmary, and in pursuance of these the Sheffield Regional Hospital Board is setting up a panel to investigate the professional behaviour or competence of one of the doctors at that hospital. We are not however concerned with that tonight.
The committee also commented on the fact that Leicester Royal Infirmary was not forewarned of the imminent arrival of a potentially serious case. I too, having examined the record of events after Nigel had left Loughborough, have formed the opinion that better arrangements should be made in such cases, and I understand that the Sheffield Regional Hospital Board has this in hand.
My hon. Friend is concerned about the arrangements for dealing with such cases


at Loughborough General Hospital. He gave notice, in a letter of which he supplied copies to the local Press, that he wished to raise two major objections to the committee of inquiry's report. First, the committee concluded that in this particular case the correct procedure was followed at Loughborough. My hon. Friend has attacked this conclusion by saying that it cannot be correct procedure for a desperately ill child to be seen only by a porter. The committee did not say that the arrangements at Loughborough were satisfactory. Indeed, it criticised them, and, even before it reported, the hospital's arrangements were so modified that any patient seeking treatment when the casualty department is closed would now be seen by a trained nurse, who then seeks advice from a doctor before disposal of the patient.
Nevertheless, it remains true, though it can be of little comfort to the bereaved parents, that the death of Nigel Haywood cannot in any way be blamed on the fact that when his parents took him to their local hospital it was a porter, rather than a nurse, who dealt with the case.

Mr. Cronin: I am in some difficulty on account of my hon. Friend's refusal to let me have the minutes of evidence, so could he tell me, when the child was taken to Loughborough General Hospital, how many resident doctors were present and how many nurses were present?

Mr. Snow: I do not have that information. My information is that there was some difficulty in obtaining the services of resident doctors for this particular case. I would like to check on that and I will advise my hon. Friend.
Concerning the minutes of evidence, persons known to my hon. Friend have this information at their disposal.
The committee's report shows that the porter promptly and efficiently telephoned the patient's general practitioner, just as a nurse would have done, and, on his advice, which was a clinical decision, summoned an ambulance to take the patient to Leicester Royal Infirmary.
My hon. Friend has implied that if Nigel Haywood had been seen at Loughborough General Hospital, not by a porter or a nurse, but by a doctor, the

outcome might have been different. He said that the dose was probably fatal, but he also said that the child might have had a better chance. This seems to be doubtful. I should therefore make it clear, at this point, that the committee of inquiry found that the dose which the child had taken was almost certainly fatal from the start. Moreover, the child could indeed have been seen in Loughborough by a doctor—his own general practitioner—but this doctor decided that the best course was to send the child by ambulance to Leicester Royal Infirmary.
My hon. Friend's other criticism is of the committee's conclusion that the casualty department at Loughborough General Hospital should be closed down entirely. I can well understand that this conclusion is unwelcome to my hon. Friend, who has for so long fought hard to keep the casualty department open. My hon. Friend referred to the large representations which have been made locally on this point.
My hon. Friend has a point in saying that the committee of inquiry misrepresented the views of the Platt Sub-Committee of the Standing Medical Advisory Committee which reported in 1962; for it is true that the Platt Committee said that at some hospitals, not designated as accident and emergency centres, there should be provision for the treatment of minor—I stress minor—injuries. The Sheffield Regional Hospital Board pointed this out in the statement under which it published the committee's report. But I must make it clear that major accident and emergency cases should normally be taken as quickly as possible to a major accident and emergency centre staffed and equipped to deal with them.
I must point out here that when my hon. Friend talks about discrimination against Loughborough or a general degeneration in the quality of services for accidents, I think that he has the position wrong. I believe that in the past he has been in charge of a casualty point. Therefore, he will know that shortage of trained medical staff, which exists all over the country, and the very high degree of sophisticated treatment which can only be provided at certain focal points, is the basis of the trouble.

Mr. Cronin: I talked about minor casualties.

Mr. Snow: I am coming to that in a moment.
That the committee of inquiry was mistaken about what the Platt Sub-Committee said does not, however, vitiate the conclusion that it reached, after studying the arrangements at Loughborough, that the casualty department there should be closed. The Sheffield Regional Hospital Board will take this recommendation into account in reviewing the accident and emergency services of its region, as my right hon. Friend has recently asked all Regional Hospital Boards to do. The Sheffield Regional Board has said in its statement that there will be full local consultations before any final decision is taken.
I would not attempt tonight to anticipate the decision which the Sheffield Regional. Hospital Board will have to take on this matter. But I would like to inform my hon. Friend of the reasons why my right hon. Friend has asked Regional. Hospital Boards to review their services, and particularly their accident and emergency services, with a view to rationalisation and economy.
As long ago as 1962 the Platt Sub-Committee recommended that the accident and emergency services should be rationalised on the basis that all injured patients requiring hospital treatment should be taken direct to accident and emergency units staffed and equipped to deal immediately with major injuries and other emergency cases at any hour of the day or night. They recommended a substantial reduction in the number of accident and emergency units then existing and a concentration of the service in a pattern of accident and emergency units which would each serve populations of at least 150,000, with some smaller hospitals receiving less serious cases.
The reason for that concentration was, and is, that if an accident and emergency centre is to be able to provide expert medical and surgical attention at any hour of the day or night on any day of the year it must be served by a substantial team of doctors, including several consultants as well as doctors of intermediate and junior rank. My hon. Friend referred to the fact that the population of the catchment area of the Loughborough Hospital was in the neigh-

bourhood of 100,000. That is not my information. The population of the town is about 40,000, and that of the surrounding area about 75,000, which is substantially lower than the 150,000 specified under the Platt Sub-Committee recommendations. At a time when the resources, particularly medical manpower, available for the National Health Service are fully stretched, we could not provide a team with all the facilities that I have mentioned which are normally provided for a population of 150,000 for the lower figure of the Loughborough catchment area.
It is difficult when people are opposed to the district general hospital principle to persuade them to surrender their loyalties and their attitudes to their local hospital which is held in great affection. I understand that, and therefore I think that my hon. Friend who is himself a surgeon must understand that, and I hope that he will be able to explain it to his constituents. It is natural that in a case like that of Nigel Haywood there is a feeling that it would be better to deal with emergency cases locally, but I assure my hon. Friend that that feeling is mistaken. The expert Platt sub-Committee was unanimous in its view that the best service could only be provided by concentrating specialist staff at large accident and emergency centres.

Mr. Cronin: My hon. Friend is answering a point which I have not raised. I am not contesting that major emergencies should be taken to a proper centre. What I am insisting on on behalf of my constituents is that there should be a proper service for minor casualties and also serious injuries or illness.

Mr. Snow: I understand that. I was addressing myself to the major principle when I said that the Platt Sub-Committee had been slightly misrepresented in the Report of the Committee of Inquiry in that the Platt Sub-Committee provided for hospitals taking in minor—and I stress minor injuries. It ought to be possible to provide such a system if there is good will on both sides, between lay and medical. My hon. Friend has a great part to play in achieving that local good will.
I do not see why, in the review being conducted by the regional hospital board under the direction of my right hon. Friend, we cannot provide some sort of organisation which will give a minimal service within
the competence and resources of the National Health Service, apart from the general intention to have

a proper scheme for major cases on the basis of the properly organised but reduced number of centres to which I have referred.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at sixteen minutes to Eleven o'clock.